I’ve been enjoying watching all the reviews of this tea come in; it’s been absolutely hilarious reading all of the wild comparisons and first impressions. That said, I knew that at some point I, too, would have to break into the sample of this that I received and give it a try and I’ve definitely been dreading it…
In fact, the only reason I ended up trying this so soon was because I was talking about the FMA chimera comparison that CrowKettle made in regard to this tea with a whole bunch of coworkers and one of them asked me to bring the sample I had with to our staff party for her to try because she was curious. So, our winter/Christmas staff party was earlier this week and true to my word I brought the sample with for anyone to try who wanted to. Trust me, I did not talk up this tea at all – basically I just warned everyone that I was like 90% sure it was gonna be awful. That said, nine people still decided to try it out so we made up a big pot and just split it up and did a group tasting. I told everyone that I was going to be posting a review of it, so I asked everyone trying it to give it a rating out of ten based on how much they liked it, and any general comments they wanted to make. Keep in mind, this is the feedback/opinions of a panel of ten (including myself) people employed at a tea company who basically spend their whole work days just drinking tea…
Casey: 4/10 – Said it was surprisingly light given the intensity of the aroma
Jules: 3/10 – “Is the Lodge black because it burned down?”
Mackenzy: 7/10 – Would drink this again without any reservations
Seth: 7/10 – Actually offered to finish off the sample cups that people didn’t want
Emily: 5/10 – “If you focus on the banana it’s not so bad”
Luz: 5/10 – Didn’t think it would be so awful overall if you didn’t take price into account
Andy: 3/10 – “I get the FMA thing…”
Stirling: 4/10 – It IS better than straight Lapsang…
Sarah: 2/10 – Spit hers back in the sink…
So, if you average all of their rating you get a rating of 4.4/10 – on Steepster that equates to a score of 44/100, essentially. That seems pretty in line with the reviews already posted…
As for my own thoughts; I do think it was doable but you don’t exactly want that to be the highest form of praise you can offer to a blend, do you? I actually liked the banana in the blend a lot though – it was pretty sweet, and candy like and if the BULK of the profile had been that sort of banana flavour with much softer hints of Lapsang I think this might have actually worked pretty well. Not, like, spectacularly but a lot more than it does currently. The biggest issue for me was that the mix of Lapsang and other things in the blend just painfully reminds me of a mix of beef jerky and tire rubber and I just cannot get into tire rubber tea. Like, that’s the furthest thing from a pleasant flavour. The smoke didn’t bother me though; I like Lapsang. Just, didn’t work in this mix of stuff so much…
Also, I think Casey was right – when you smell the dry leaf this smells vile, but the steeped tea definitely doesn’t have the same intensity even if it’s not good. I think I’m gonna agree with the overall average rating given by our staff…
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I would be happy to send you the rest of mine and you can give to those who enjoyed it. I want it gone and if someone will actually enjoy it than I’m happy for them to have it :)
Thank you, thank you, thank you for conducting that survey! Also, bless those 7/10 people.
And I 100% agree on the banana. The goodness of the banana flavouring makes me even sadder about the other oddball flavours it has to live with. I would love to see an AU banana tea this isn’t quite so “adventurous.”
@VariaTEA I’ll ask the two of them next time I work with either and see if they’d actually want more of it :P
So interesting how different everyone is experiencing this one. I thought this smelled worse steeped than the leaf did. Happy a couple of them enjoyed it
oh lordy…tomorrow’s going to be a good day!
:)
Well, that was a fun read. LOL
I would be happy to send you the rest of mine and you can give to those who enjoyed it. I want it gone and if someone will actually enjoy it than I’m happy for them to have it :)
Thank you, thank you, thank you for conducting that survey! Also, bless those 7/10 people.
And I 100% agree on the banana. The goodness of the banana flavouring makes me even sadder about the other oddball flavours it has to live with. I would love to see an AU banana tea this isn’t quite so “adventurous.”
@VariaTEA I’ll ask the two of them next time I work with either and see if they’d actually want more of it :P
So interesting how different everyone is experiencing this one. I thought this smelled worse steeped than the leaf did. Happy a couple of them enjoyed it
oh lordy…tomorrow’s going to be a good day!
:)
Well, that was a fun read. LOL