Featured & New Tasting Notes

hmm this really really tastes like Tea! I know that should be kinda obvious but with the list of flavors I was expecting the tea part to be mostly covered up.
and the rose flavor is barely there!
wow… this is light and subtle but the flavor really pops for a white. the coconut and the vanilla go very well together (obviously) but don’t cover up the tea… awesome.
Although I don’t know why the listing here on steepster has blueberry on it. My sample pack does not say blueberry and I don’t taste any either

my first mighty leaf tea! the packages are nice because there see-through :) i dont know y i like see-through things so much but that makes it more exciting for me. the little bags are cute too because you can see that they are sewn together. i have to admit i bought might leaf because Rabbysmom made them all look so good so i had to try it. i mean its loose leaf but bagged which means i can be lazy lol

this has a soft delicate flavor that i can pick out as the white tea (which i have noticed i have become VERY fond of) its a soft and relaxing tea mmmmm it has a fruitiness to it that i expected to be more melon-y but its more pear/apple-y the color is a very pretty yellow. there is nothing strong about this tea :)

im glad i picked this out because we are having a shrimp teriyaki stir fry and this will balance out with the bold flavors.

I really like this tea. It is very smooth considering it is made from powder and very flavorful too! It kind of has a hint of graham crackers which is surprisingly good. I enjoy it

I was thrilled to receive a tea swap package from the lovely teaplz recently and this was in it.

Oh, Steepsterites.

Pear tea is not something I’ve had a lot of good luck with. It’s my favorite fruit [thinking about the validity of that statement and deciding it’s definitely true], and therefore it’s not something that I’m going to be satisfied with if I have to reach for in a tea. [Kind of like the elusive pumpkin, I suppose.] I don’t want it to be light and floaty, though light and floaty pear done well is better than artificial or this ain’t pear. I want it to be in my face and smack me around a bit.

Oh, Steepsterites.

The fact that this combines with my favorite dessert flavor [thinking about the validity of that statement and deciding it’s definitely true] means that this tea could easily be my Icarus. It could soar up high on the warm air currents and then tumble silently before crashing fatally into the sea.

Fortunately, this tea is like Icarus’ happy ending. It’s the Icarus Remix. Pears have a relatively short season where they’re really good [or at least it seems that way because I can’t get enough of them when they’re around] and this tea is going to become like crack for me, especially when pears aren’t in season. I’m already calling it, everyone. When I get really effing weird on Steepster [weirder – that is] and start spitting nonsense, it’s going to be because I’m either out of Ryokucha or this tea. Look forward to it.

Take a second to travel to Imaginationland for a second with me here. Think about a nice, ripe, juicy pear. You know, where they’re in that state of limbo between firm and mushy and when you bite into it you have to have a towel on hand [if you care about that kind of thing] because you inevitably end up making a mess. Now, cut that pear up into little half inch cubes and stick them in a bowl. You still with me? Okay, now there’s a saucepan on the stove to your left. It’s got some caramel sauce bubbling in it – deep orange-brown, bubbling, thick, and satiny. Give it a good stir, cut off the heat, and let it cool for a minute. Excellent. Take the caramel, and pour that all over the pear bits. The whole thing. Don’t hold back. Stir everything around gently, do not smush the pear.

Now, take out a spoon. Put the spoon in your mouth. Remove your belt and wrap it around your head. Take off your shoes and go outside. There will be a bag of trash in your trashcan. Take that out, and…

I’m kidding, I’m kidding.

Okay, take the spoon. Dip into the mixture and…I think you can take it from there.

That is what this tea tasted like to me. It was rich, and the caramel and the pear were both just so very much present. Between the mouthfeel and the taste and just the absolute giddiness I got from the fact that they nailed the pear so hard it won’t see straight until the weekend. Just…AH.

The two tastes didn’t combine often. When they did, it was maybe just a smidge weird, but the majority of the time it tasted like a piece of pear coated in decadent caramel, and Zeus help me, it’s going to take an insane amount of willpower to keep this sample from disappearing before I order it.

As it cooled, the caramel started to melt away a bit and the pear came to the forefront. The only thing that could keep me from being disappointed at this is the fact that I love pear to the point that it raises eyebrows, but the fact that the tea did this for me is something that I think y’all should be aware of. [This was also true of the second steep – more pear than anything else. I let it sit for seven minutes on the second infusion, but I’ll try steeping it a little longer next time. The more mileage I can get out of this the better, I think.] Oh, and the rooibos didn’t come into the picture at all.

Anyhow, win. Just…win. It was such a win that everything else could have lost that day and I wouldn’t have cared much. The ONLY reason that this tea isn’t going to get a flat out 100 from me is unfortunately because of something that also makes it so awesome. It is sweet and rich and a full on dessert tea. I can’t drink this every day, though I wish I could. If I did, I’d get sick of it, which would make my tea self cry, and this is not a tea I want to have to take out of rotation.

Anyhow.

ABSO-EFFING-LUTELY DELICIOUS. Thanks, teaplz!

It’s been so long since I’ve had any tea!!!!!! After holiday travels to distant lands, battles with various viruses/viri, and a good heaping of “damn those people on Steepster really love their tea and while their love of tea makes Steepster possible it also makes me quite busy,” I just haven’t found myself with a nice warm cuppa in hand in quite some time.

Luckily, my gf saw our feature of 52Teas’ Coconut Cream Pie and knowing how much I love that sh** (even though we just had Strawberry Rhubarb pie) she sneakily got a pouch for us to enjoy. Now on to the tea!

I opened the pouch and was pleased to see plenty of large coconut shavings mixed throughout. The black tea seemed like a pretty good quality, albeit a little on the smaller side (I’m assuming because of the plastic pouch it travels in). What surprised me the most is the very noticeable mint smell coming out of the bag. I read the other reviews of this and nowhere do I see mention of mint, but I get a ton of that…I think it’s a natural part of the coconut (or maybe I’m just coco-nuts) – sorry.

The brew has a nice darkish browny amber-likey color a you definitely get that punch of coconut and that mint thing I mentioned. Sip time :)

Ok, I feel this is more of a coconut tea than a coconut cream pie tea. There are some more subtle cream/dairy undertones that compliment the natural flavor of the black tea, but I’m still feeling like it’s not quite a slice of coconut cream pie. Great coconut flavor though (if you’re into that, def give this a try)! I’m still getting that after-dinner mint-iness a little, which surprises me but isn’t unpleasant.

Overall, a great experience, good flavor, nice to sip. Not quite a coconut cream pie flavor explosion in your mouth, but I see the potential. I’ll definitely be trying this again soon and I will most certainly be attempting their tea latte recipe with this -it’s supposed to deliver the greatest pie flavor you can get. (speaking of that…if a certain someone happens to be reading this and they are planning to stop at the store on the way home, it would be pretty cool of them to pick up 3 (14oz) cans of fat free sweetened condensed milk :)

And another JacquelineM tea.

Wow.

This is heads and shoulders above the only other coconut black tea that I’ve tried, Adagio’s. I like the idea of combining coconut with Nilgiri tea instead of Adagio’s Ceylon. The taste is improved tenfold. And this has more of a toasted coconut taste than Adagio’s version – not sure if that’s due to the Nilgiri, or if it actually uses toasted coconut.

Either way, it’s really, really good. I may have to order a full size. Yummmm.

This is by far the most pleasant smelling fruit tea I’ve come across to date. The taste, while not living up to the aroma, is very enjoyable. I use more of this tea than my standard oolong to get the same richness of flavour, which is a problem when you are using tea this expensive and difficult to come by here in Europe (I picked up my last batch in Kobe last year and I’m running out!).

Prior to infusion – smells like sweet and sour Thai Food
During Infusion – smells like Indian Spiced Lemon Grass
After infusion is complete – smells like Lemon-Ginger-Spice Type Rice or something.

The color is a cloudy brown.

Thankfully there isn’t much of a Hibiscus flavor…but enough to know it’s still there. I can also taste the Lemon, Ginger, and Coriander more than the rest of the ingredients.

This isn’t bad…This isn’t terrific, either. I will finish my cup but – to me- it’s not memorable – but then again I wouldn’t usually go right to this type of blend if it where sitting on the shelf in front of me…if you know what I mean. I think there are many out there that would enjoy it, however.

I always make a pot of tea in the morning to drink along side my breakfast and to wake me up. I bring the same tea to class with me in my ever so handy thermos.

This morning the tea was the roobos tropica with some jasmine pearls because I was in the mood for something a bit fruity this morning.

This was a tea given to me for my birthday last year. I only have about a 1/3 of the tin left and I can’t wait to reuse the tin for another tea because it’s very pretty.

I have tried assam teas from this source before and never found any that lit my fire. But this year’s supply of this estate tea is a winner! The leaf is small and twisted, not broken. It is described as tippy tippy and malty sweet. I have to agree, that with a bit of sweetner and my usual short steep this brews up a fantastic cup of tea. The brew is dark amber, the aroma is sweet and wonderful. I don’t add dairy, preferring to enjoy the full malty strong brew. I highly recommend this assam for assam fans.

The scent is sweetly vegetal with notes of cooked carrots and roasted nuts and is thoroughly pleasant.

However, the tea’s flavor is much sharper and brighter than the aroma would purport creating an interesting though slightly off-putting contrast.

. . . not very complex, yet fresh and deceptively delicious in its duplicity. Tricky, indeed . . .
-
I have recently found that using less leaf cuts the sharpness and allows a honeysuckle flavor to come through.

So… we bought Adagio’s triniTEA (automatic tea brewer) to supplement the Zarafina. It was getting crazy with waiting for the other person’s tea to finish brewing and for resteeps, what do you do with the leaves, and so on. We thought that the increased capacity of the triniTEA would be nice for making large pitchers of iced tea, as well.

The first batch didn’t go so well. We’ll ignore the machine’s faults and just talk about the tea… Nathaniel followed the instructions that came with the machine and not the instructions that came with the tea, so he put the timing knob on 5 minutes (Teavana says to brew the English Breakfast for 2-3 minutes and the Lemon Youkou for 5-6 minutes, but we usually just brew it as a black tea). The result was BITTER and had no lemon taste. UGH. It was totally overbrewed.

Not the tea’s fault, or the machine, really. We have to do another run with a shorter time.
(I’m leaving the rating where it is because when brewed right this tea is really good)

Yummy flavor. I followed the label instructions and got a very light golden tea. Nice anise flavor, especially lightly sweetened with some agave nectar. The second infusion was very good as well.

I was hoping that this could replace my licorice without having the same worries about blood pressure, etc, so I googled start anise side effects. Did you know there are two types of star anise? There is a Chinese star anise, which is used as a flavoring, and a Japanese star anise, which is used solely for decoration. The Japanese star anise is deadly. AND you can’t tell which one you have by looking at the dried seed pods. The FDA issued an advisory against consuming teas containing star anise in 2003. Chinese star anise is also used in the manufactor of tamiflu. All very interesting stuff. It tastes good enough that I’ll ignore that FDA advisory.

I enjoyed this chai very much. The aroma of the dry leaves is slightly spicy with a chocolate scent. When brewed, the aroma of the tea is enhanced: stronger spiced scent with the hint of chocolate. I tried this in my usual array of chai teas: hot with no additives then sugar and milk one at a time.

Brewed hot without sugar or milk it is enjoyable. There is a spice flavor with a sweet undertone. When sugar is added, it enhances the very slight chocolate flavor that was the undertone and makes it more prevalent. When sugar and milk are added it makes for a delicious creamy, spicy tea, with a suggestion of chocolate.

What makes this tea stand out from the rest of the Adagio Chai teas is not the chocolate, or the natural sweetness along with the spice; it is the fact that the tea is still delicious once it cools. This is a true rarity for me, as I do not like when chai tea cools, I feel the spices become overwhelming and you lose all flavor of the tea. This is not the case with Chocolate Chai, the spices are stronger when cooled, but they are still mellowed by the underlying sweetness of chocolate, which allows the true flavor of the tea to still shine through.

Overall, this is my favorite chai tea. Highly recommended. Definitely going to need to get more.

This has been my favorite tea for over two years now, its malty sweetness cannot be matched for this type of tea. I haven’t found any other Yunnan black tea that has a similar flavor. It also makes a WONDERFUL iced tea. I mix with a natural cane sugar (Florida Crystals) not the darker the lighter sugar. Everyone who has tasted this at my place is just struck at how good of iced tea this is compared to anything they have ever tried. I make a pot in the morning and then use it for iced tea later in the day. This is a dark infusion and gets sweeter as it cools. While they say you can do multiple infusions a lot of the complexity is lost in a later infusion.

I missed you, Steepster.

And really, I’m not back yet. I’m still down south, where I’ve been since the 22nd (and somehow it’s still absolutely freezing outside…why do I feel cheated?). I was totally incommunicado for the holidays, which were lovely, mellow, and full of accidentally oversteeped cups of tea brewed at random temperatures…and then I was tea free for the last week, because I had my wisdom teeth out, and hot liquids were a no-no (to say nothing of the fact that caffeine and vicodin make poor bedpartners).

Today I actually got to brew myself a half-cup of chai. It was as though the pill-filled universe I’ve been existing in flickered for a moment on a faulty circuit, and normalcy was briefly restored. I may escape the matrix yet! With a flight home Monday to look forward to, things are looking up (though I may very well be shredded into a thousand tiny pieces by two very angry, lonely cats when I walk through that front door. The possibility exists that I may not survive how glad they will be to see me).

Despite my inability to drink any tea, I did get to buy some tea the day before my extractions. There’s a Teavana nearby. I loaded upon Samurai mate and splurged on a little bit of their Golden Monkey, as I sort of like Adagio’s, and I’m a huge fan of the Golden Spring. Why not, right? Fujian tea and I seem to get along pretty well.

Take this with not just one but several grains of salt: my mouth is not completely normal right now, for one thing, and for another I have no ability to gauge temperature here, but…

I’m just not that excited about this tea. Malty, yes. Bitter? Yeah. Not just bitter but a bit sour on the aftertaste. I’m sure I can lessen this by backing the temperature off, so this rating is just tentative. It certainly seems to have the thick, brothy mouthfeel that I liked so much in my Golden Spring, but the flavor seems so forward. There are elements of that prune/raisin sweetness in there, but they’re outdone by the bitter malty flavor. I guess I’ll have to try it again another time. Glad I only bought a small amount, though.

Hopefully it at least fuels me through reading the insane amount of updates from you guys that I now have to parse through! I’m excited to see what everybody was trying over the holidays, and I cannot wait to get home…home, where my Samovar and Teafrog orders from pre-Christmas are patiently waiting for me to pick them up from the front desk…

I actually bought a yuzu in preparation for this tea. After all, how can I comment on a flavored tea if I don’t know what the flavor is supposed to taste like? I ate my yuzu early this morning so thought today was a great time to try this one. I enjoyed the fruit so I hope to enjoy this tea. The tea doesn’t smell quite like fresh yuzu, but it is still noticeably yuzu. The brewed tea smells even less like yuzu – the initial smell is of fresh, vegetal sencha and there’s a little tingle of yuzu underneath.

The taste is intriguing. I didn’t get a noticeable yuzu flavor until I took a few sips one after the other. It seems like the yuzu taste builds but seems to come through the most in the aftertaste. But now I’m getting it some on the very tip of my tongue as I begin to sip. It’s a surprisingly good counterpoint to the sencha. I wouldn’t have thought the yuzu would go well with the sweet, buttery and vegetal taste of the sencha, but it does. It adds a subtle citrus sharpness that keeps the sencha from being too rich or thick.

I’m not quite sure how to rate this. I keep expecting this to taste rich and thick but each sip surprises me with a clean, refreshing citrus flavor. So I can’t quite figure out how high I want to rate this. Somewhere in between the two green smileys but not sure where… Though a big point it this teas favor is the aftertaste – sweet, citrus and buttery. Good stuff.

So I decided to open up the Golden Moon Tea Sampler today. The first one I tried is this one. The leaves do not have a strong aroma, but I also do not have a lot of tea to smell here.

I steeped it hot for four minutes. I tried it with and without sugar, but really found very little difference between the two. The tea is very simple. It is a complex white tea in that it makes a pale liquor, with delicate veggie fragrance but a strong white tea flavor. The ginger is mostly lost in brewing, but you do find it as an undertone note in the tea. Which is good, because overpowering ginger would not be enjoyable.

Overall, I found this tea to be very enjoyable. I would definitely buy a tin of this.

Auggy already commented on how to drive Jackee Muntz into Caramel City, so I’m going to take this opportunity to get a little goofy on y’all. [Like I really need an excuse.] I can’t take credit for this idea. While I’m sure it’s been done elsewhere, I’m sapping inspiration from both an episode of Hey Ash Whatcha Playin’ and a rather brilliant Yelp review a friend of mine wrote. If any of you have never stumbled across text-based games, you might not get this. So here’s something ridiculous that may or may not help: http://bit.ly/DgJqE [Homestar Runner, Dungeonman 3].

Me: Jackee, what the hell? Why don’t you taste like caramel anymore?

Jackee: I do not understand “caramel.”

Me: Cut it out. What I am doing wrong?

Jackee: What’s a “wrong”?

Me: …What?

Jackee: You are holding a glass MUG. Inside of it sit eight ounces of dark copper liquid. Steam rises from the top, swirling into nothingness. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: …
SIP TEA.

Jackee: You take a sip of the TEA and burn your TONGUE. Cursing like a sailor whose ship has chanced upon a Kraken, you bang your HEAD against the COUNTER in frustration at your stupidity. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: HEY!

Jackee: What’s a “HEY”?

Me: Grumble. LET TEA COOL.

Jackee: You sit aimlessly, watching your TEA while you wait for it to drop an appropriate amount in TEMPERATURE. Occasionally, you blow on it, though you are unsure of its effectiveness on the actual cooling process. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: SIP TEA.

Jackee: You take a sip of TEA. The mouthfeel is thin, but not quite watery. The TEA is flavorful – strong, with notes of smoke and pine and a light sweetness. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: POUR TEA OUT.

Jackee: Well, that was wasteful of you. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: It’s not my fault you don’t taste good to me anymore! It’s your fault you don’t taste like caramel!

Jackee: I do not understand that command.

Me: Sigh. READ STEEPSTER.

Jackee: You log into your Steepster account. New reviews have been posted. Please click here: http://steepster.com/aug3zimm/posts/23176. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Just to walk you through my thought process at this point, now I’m really thinking. When I had Jackee the first few times, I was drinking out of a different mug and I didn’t know that my utiliTEA was messing me up temperature wise. Even when it turned, I don’t want to say bad, but “not as good” on me, I didn’t know about my utiliTEA’s little issue for the majority of my experimentation. I’d get a cup of caramel maybe one time out of five, but the parameters wouldn’t match up so I was starting to think it was all in my head.

By the time I figured out the temperature problem, I barely had any Jackee Muntz left, so I tried a few cups on the stovetop and they rendered much of the same. I also tried it in a travel mug, and the smell thing didn’t seem to fix it either. I did discover that steep time didn’t appear to have too much of an effect, though, so long as I kept it somewhere around 3:30 to 4:30, it was pretty consistent.

Part of me must have still thought I could get it back to caramel. I think that I was partially re-invigorated after the discovery of my utiliTEA temperature issue, so I re-ordered Series 2, but the first cup of the first tin was not successful either. After reading Auggy’s review, something clicked though. A lot of it had to do with the fact that she had actually found the caramel and that gave me hope [and also reassurance that I hadn’t completely lost it]. But also I was looking at the temperature [205°] and thinking about maybe it was the shape of her travel mug. But my mug hadn’t been shaped all that differently from the one I like to use now. Except…it had been a bit larger. So maybe the tea to water ratios were a bit different… No, I DON’T KNOW WHY I DIDN’T THINK ABOUT THAT BEFORE.

Me: CHANGE MUG.

Jackee: Which mug would you like to change to? To see your current mugs, type INV.

Me: INV.

Jackee: BODUM MUG, CAFÉ MUG, BIG TEAL MUG NOT SUITABLE FOR DRINKING TEA, BORING STARBUCKS MUG.

This is the mug I was originally drinking tea out of, by the way – http://bit.ly/4Am3Xb – the bottom top one. Oops.

Me: CAFÉ MUG.

Jackee: You switched your BODUM MUG for your CAFÉ MUG.

Me: MAKE MORE TEA.

Jackee: You turn on your KETTLE and wait for the water to heat, measuring out a heaping teaspoon of TEA before dropping it into your INFUSER. In a few minutes, the WATER is boiling. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: LET WATER COOL 195°F.

Jackee: You wait impatiently while the water cools to the appropriate temperature. You really should learn to be a little more tolerant.

Me: SCREW YOU.

Jackee: I do not understand “SCREW.”

Me: MEASURE WATER 11 OZ.

Jackee: You measure out 11 ounces of WATER into a MEASURING CUP.

Me: POUR WATER.

Jackee: POUR WATER where?

Me: Into the mug, you idiot.

Jackee: I do not understand “idiot.”

Me: POUR WATER INTO MUG.

Jackee: You pour the WATER into your MUG.

Me: STEEP 3:15.

Jackee: Doesn’t that seem a bit short?

Me: Now you’re helpful?

Jackee: I do not understand the question.

Me: STEEP 3:45.

Jackee: You let the TEA steep for 3 MINUTES and 45 SECONDS, watching a couple of stupid VIDEOS in the the meantime before removing the INFUSER.

Me: SIP TEA.

Jackee: You burn your TONGUE and your IQ drops another few points. You take out a FLYSWATTER and slap yourself across the face. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: LET TEA COOL.

Jackee: You sit aimlessly, watching your TEA while you wait for it to drop an appropriate amount in TEMPERATURE. Occasionally, you blow on it, though you are unsure of its effectiveness on the actual cooling process. Exits are to the NORTH, SOUTH, and WEST.

Me: SIP TEA.

Jackee: The TEA feels heavy in your mouth. A soft note of pine hits your TONGUE, but then gently fades away. You are greeted with the taste of burnt sugar.

Me: SIP TEA.

Jackee: The TEA feels heavy in your mouth. A soft note of pine hits your TONGUE, but then gently fades away. You are greeted with the taste of burnt sugar.

Me: SIP TEA.

Jackee: The TEA feels heavy in your mouth. A soft note of pine hits your TONGUE, but then gently fades away. You are greeted with the taste of burnt sugar.

Me: SIP TEA.

Jackee: The taste of burnt sugar slowly melts into the background and a salty note enters the flavors sliding around on your TONGUE. Anxious, you hold the TEA a bit longer in your mouth and are greeted with the overwhelming taste of caramel.

Me: OH SWEET POSEIDON, THANK YOU!!!

Jackee: What is a “Poseidon”?

Me: I hate you.

Jackee: I do not understand that command.

Me: …
INV TEA.

Jackee: A FATAL ERROR HAS OCCURRED. NUMBER OF TEAS HAS EXCEEDED CAPACITY. PROGRAM WILL TERMINATE.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how I won Thursday.

Just a few more notes on the tea, because really that’s what all that mess up there was about, I did try steeping this at around 185 and didn’t quite get there in terms of the caramel, so I think that your temperature needs to be at least around 190°F, and could probably go up to 200°F but 205°F might be pushing it. [Auggy mentioned to me that her mug was cold and so it probably temperature dropped when it was in there somewhat significantly from the 205°F.] All this being said, all I can say definitively regarding the temperature is that it should be just below boiling if you hope to achieve this. It’s possible that we’re both just mad.

In regards to the tea:water ratio, I use one of these – http://bit.ly/5SpSvE – and when I measured it against a teaspoon last night it was like…1 1/4 tsp. Give or take a bit. I fill that up that spoon with just a teensy bit over, so somewhere thereabouts. The amount of water I put in the cup is somewhere between 11 and 12 oz, closer to 11.

All of this is assuming you a) have some Jackee Muntz on hand and b) want to try to replicate the caramel taste. I usually don’t get this specific in my logs, I know, but this has been bothering me for quite some time and I’m afraid that you’re seeing the aftermath of my GEEK OUT session here.

And thus endeth the really long tea log. I’m giving Jackee the ratings bump back to where he deserves to be, now that he has realized his potential for me again.

Squee!

Finally back from holiday which means that I’m reunited with my tea collection. On the way back though, I stocked up on Takibi so I can enjoy it year-round. Takibi is a flavored oolong from Lupicia. Takibi is a very seasonal tea and they usually only have it in stock in the winter time. It has a very subtle fruit flavor which is very refreshing.

I really enjoy the nose on this tea. It smells of toasted coconut and has a very subtle and sweat taste. The flavor is not overpowering, but it’s just enough to make this tea one of my new favorites. Certainly not something I would drink every day, but a really good late night tea if I’m in the mood for something different.

My father got me a gift certificate to SpecialTeas for Christmas, and I got myself a TON of teas. (Two sampler packs, 6 samples, and a few other 1/4 lb packages). (I warn you now, I’ll be rating a lot of SpecialTea over the next few days. )

This tea is one I picked because aside from Candy Cane Lane, my current favorite ever tea is Strawberry Lemonade from Teavana. So I thought, hey, let’s try something similar from SpecialTeas.

The tea is yummy. Really yummy. The aroma is subtle, and I’d prefer a little more in that arena, but the taste makes up for it. You can definitely taste the lemon-lime-y-ness of it. I can see myself making pitchers of this in the summer, iced with a bit of sweetener and having it be the savior of a hot, sticky, nasty day.

I still prefer the Strawberry Lemonade Teavana flavor, but that’s because it’s a hint sweeter. However, I really like this, and can see having both of these teas around for a long time.

Still a noob, so this is the only Gunpowder I’ve tried. There are others I want to sample, but I’m happy with this one right now. Really happy.

I was warned about Gunpowder by my sister — too late. I had already ordered it. So I had this whole approach/avoidance thing going in my head when it arrived. Never fear. It became one of my faves from the first cup.

I get three infusions out of my Gunpowder, each one different. The first steep (3 mins.) renders a brash brew with a bit of bitterness and nice complexity. The second infusion (5 mins.) is my favorite. The bitterness is greatly reduced and the flavor is rich and mellow. The third infusion (7-10 mins.) is well worth hanging around for. The long infusion time is necessary to coax the last bit of flavor from the leaves. Round three is mild and tasty.

The thing I like best about this tea is the incredibly sweet after taste. It lingers long after the last sip is drained from the cup. Gunpowder afterglow. It keeps me coming back for more.

The other thing I like about Adagio Gunpowder is that it is the cheapest tea in my cupboard. Dirty dirt cheap. It’s almost like drinking for free.

And did I mention good?