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Plum Deluxe Advent Calendar – Day 18

I smelled this and it smelled really familiar. I then tasted it and it tasted really familiar. Then I realized it was butter. This tea is liquid butter. Perhaps a buttery shortbread but buttery is the key word here. While accurately named, I just don’t think this is a flavor of beverage I am looking for.

Kenneth Ave Advent Calendar – Day 18

I made this iced and it’s quite good. It’s meant to be like a wine and it has an ice wine quality to it for sure. It’s sweet and has a great blackberry flavor. However, it’s not fully rounded. I think the black base keeps this all a bit flat, which could be wine-like at times but I’m not loving it. This is surprisingly better than I thought it would be and also better than a lot of the other Kenneth Ave teas I’ve had.

CuppaGeek Advent Calendar – Day 18

The little package says “Spiced Fall Eve” but I am going to assume its this tea. This is an interesting one. It is definitely on the sweeter side. In fact, I would say this is what I would have expected Sweet Pumpkin Chai to taste like. It’s got a sweet cinnamon/pumpkin flavor with a touch of ginger lingering in the aftertaste. I think the base also adds a honey-quality here. It’s nice and screams Fall to me.

52 Teas 12 Teas of Christmas – Day 6

Leave it to Anne to make a Lavender Earl Grey sound appealing. The Vanilla Whipped was calling me. And this smells awesome!! Like I want it as a perfume or a candle or something. However, in taste its lavender forward which is not for me. One of my best friends informed me she loves Lavender Earl Greys though so I know the perfect place to send this.

Geek + Tea Advent Teas – Day 6

I pulled this out and turned to my brother-in-law, who we determined is definitely a Hufflepuff, and was like “its your tea!” However, I did not share it with him. Maybe I should have.

When I noticed this was a rooibos with chocolate and honeysuckle, that screamed latte to me. And since its December, most lattes get a little touch of eggnog thrown in for thickness and festive vibes. So, this was made as an eggnog latte, thrown into my comfy looking plaid mug, and topped with yellow (obviously!) sprinkles. I then enjoyed it while playing Hungry, Hungry Hippos, which was one of my Hannukah gifts to my sister since we have a joke that every time my brother-in-law goes to the firehall their baby “hungry hungry hippos”, as in he wants to eat far more often than normal meaning my sister has to work that much harder to feed, entertain, etc. It all just seemed very Hufflepuff. I view that house as the friendly house, and with traits like kind and loyal, I find them to be comforting as well. So comforting latte vibes in a comforting mug while playing a genuinely friendly and just fun and silly game seemed like the best way to have this blend.

As for the taste, its fine but not what I would have expected from a Hufflepuff blend. Also, not the best flavor overall. It was sort of a standard chocolate rooibos that leaned into the honey notes of the base. Good but nothing I need to have again.

DAVIDsTEA Matcha Advent Calendar – Day 18

I don’t recall having this previously but I must have since it has a 67 rating on steepster. I made it as an iced latte, mostly because I didn’t have time to wait for milk to froth for a hot latte. It ended up being very good. It was like chocolate milk but a touch more sophisticated. Definitely leaned into chocolate more than it did coffee, which is my preference but may not be for other people so worth mentioning. Bumping the rating…

DAVIDsTEA Matcha Advent Calendar – Day 17

I did it again! I accidentally hit delete note and deleted my note from yesterday about the peach matcha infused milk chocolate star. So the gist of it was that the milk chocolate stars are better than the white chocolate ones, however I didn’t taste the matcha at all. The matcha was noticeable in texture as it made it gritty and I could have done without that.

Plum Deluxe Advent Calendar – Day 17

I’m finished exams and with that means I have more time for advents so I decided to incorporate the Plum Deluxe one that arrived super late. I also had fun opening the earlier days that I missed. One thing I noticed, however, is plum deluxe likes to mix bases a lot. I think this one is both black tea and honeybush (I could be wrong so don’t quote me) and I just don’t see the appeal. At least these are both steeped at the same temperature usually but I just don’t love the combination.

Here I think the honeybush base is contributing flavor so maybe it was added for that purpose. There is a lot of the honey quality from the honeybush base. But this is banana and honestly it’s pretty close to banana bread. However, there is something about this that keeps it from being truly banana bread.

DIY Advent Calendar – Day 17

Sipdown (304)

Thank you Sil! for the share. I think for me this sounded more exciting than it was. It definitely had a great maple flavor, and I don’t even know if its supposed to but it did. Malty, bready, cinnamon and maple. So overall definitely captures cinnamon french toast. However, for some reason I thought there would be more. I don’t even know what is missing but I feel like it needs something more.

52 Teas 12 Teas of Christmas – Day 5

I scratched off this label and immediately thought Roswell Strange will be happy. I was also happy. I can’t say I have ever had a clafoutis, but I am pretty sure it’s the giant fruit pancake thing. I could be wrong.

This has a nice cranberry pear flavor. It’s fruity and creamy and nice. Alas, I can’t help but compare it to DAVIDsTEA’s Cranberry Pear (aka as the Cranberry Pear tea, imo) and it’s just not quite there. I blame the base tea. Cranberry Pear is mostly fruit with some black tea. This is on a green tea base and that’s just not my preference. It is light so it does work well enough, but it still contributes a touch of grassiness I could do without