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Round 2 battles of the sipdown tournament continue today with this tea vs. What the Fluff by 52 Teas. I am pretty confident which tea is going to win but let’s taste test anyways. Check out the review for What the Fluff here: https://steepster.com/rachel12610/posts/416407#

Today its a bit less creamy than the last time I had this. It is more of a true milk oolong, with a thin milky profile and the soft floral notes of the base. It’s smooth and not at all drying, so its quite nice. An easy drinking tea.

I pulled this out and decided to make it both iced and hot. It seemed it could be good either way and given it was caffeine free I decided to make it both ways.

I am drinking the iced first to give the hot a little bit of time to cool down. It’s both good and bad. The blackberry leaf makes it too sweet but this is creamy and has a nice mango flavor.

Hot, it is also alright. I find the flavor is less distinctly mango. It also doesn’t have the same creamy aspect that is coming through in the iced tea. It is still sweet but not overly so, thus good in some respects and not great in others.

Overall, this tea is good but not my favorite.

Latte Sipdown (288)

I was inspired by AJRimmer to make this as a latte and what a brilliant plan that was. It’s such a good latte! Cooked banana deliciousness. Bananas Foster if you will. Caramelized, sweet, deliciously cooked banana. Not exactly banoffee pie but close enough and I am left oh. so. happy. Bumping the rating from 78 and super sad that I am saying goodbye to this blend! If Pudtea comes back, I will want a whole lot of this blend!!

Also, Happy Birthday Roswell Strange!!!! My brother loves all things banana so instead of cake, he gets things like Banana Pudding or Banoffee Pie for his birthday. Fitting that I would finish this blend, one Ros really enjoys, on her birthday!!!

Sipdown (287)

Thank you Sil for sharing this one with me! It has been fun the past couple of times to try it as it is a really nice caramel tea. It’s got a thickness to it and a lot of rich and sophisticated caramelized sugar notes. It’s good and I think it would have won had this not been a sipdown. However, since this one is finished, the Genmaicha wins by default in my sipdown tournament. Check out the note for that tea here: https://steepster.com/rachel12610/posts/416356

Yesterday was the last of the first round of battles in my sipdown tournament. While I thought through the initial pairings, I didn’t think to pair the pairs so that the winning teas were also well suited. So today I have this genmaicha going against a TeaG Caramel black tea. Weird combo. Also, I did it again and overestimated how much I had of Caramel so this one wins, even before I drink either. Oops.

Thankfully this is a pretty nice genmaicha. The base stays muted which means its mostly a whole lot of the roasty rice notes. That is my preference so I have been enjoying this one.

Check out the tasting note for Caramel here: https://steepster.com/rachel12610/posts/416358

Latte Sipdown (288)

I overleafed this and it sort of tastes like soap. I am not a fan. This got dumped. I think that may be on me but it could also be the bergamot.

Sipdown (288)

I drank this last night and realized that I had enough for one more serving. I decided to just take the sipdown and finish this one off. It’s a fine tea but never really wowed me. The lime in it is my favorite part but past the sweet lime, I mostly get rooibos and some ginger which plays off the pepper quality of the base. I don’t get much rum and personally I am okay with that.

Sipdown (289)

This is one of those blends that has a bunch of herbal ingredients that sound like they should be in a potion. It’s not for me because it also tastes like a mess of herbal ingredients, but sweet, thanks to the blackberry leaf. Always fun to try new things so thank you Roswell Strange for the share but the one teabag was more than enough.

This tea went up against another sweet berry tea, Strawberry Macaron by Cuppa Geek, for my March Madness sipdown battle. I ran out of Strawberry Macaron after the one cup so this tea won by default, even before I got to trying them. That said, this tea likely would have won after tasting them as well. Check out the tasting note for Strawberry Macaron here: https://steepster.com/rachel12610/posts/416277

This tea also cooled but its not nearly as astringent as Strawberry Macaron. Instead, the raspberry and coconut come through. This is showing its age slightly since I find DAVIDsTEA coconut doesn’t age the best (I remember Gold Rush and how good that was but how it went rancid so fast) – that means the coconut can read slightly lotion-y. That said, the raspberry note is really good and the coconut is not so far gone that its offensive. Timely that its included in the tournament though and is moving on.