Blueberry Muffin

Using this for the sipdown prompt “A tea flavored like a favorite baked good.” (Though I think all baked goods, banana bread excluded, would count as a “favorite baked good” for me, hahahaha…)

Prepared this cold brewed, which is my typical prep style for heavy, chunky fruit teas. I’m sipping on it now from a chilled water bottle to re-hydrate after a grocery run, and it is very refreshing. It is sweeter than I expected (ya’ll know me, I’m a tart ’n tangy hibi fan) and because of that sweetness, I am seeing the blueberry muffin comparison. The blueberry does have that jammy/syrupy sweet taste I associate with blueberry baked goods.

While I normally drink my fruit teas cold, due to the sweet nature of this one, I think I’ll have to try a warm cuppa this evening. Still satisfying cold, just lacking the tartness I typically expect and enjoy in a fruit tea cold brew.

#tiffanys2021sipdown Tea #3
#drinkwhatyouown January slot 1

Last one from 1/1, on IG @teaaholic has a #drinkwhatyouown & my dad made & gifted me a wooden advent calendar per my request. I will pick 25 teas each month (one for each drawer) and have my boyfriend randomize them for me. This one was the first one. I love this tea, one of my favorites because I enjoy fruit, creamy desserts, muffins, herbal tisanes, and DT. Since this was a larger sampler packet (15g) they gave out many autumns back (2016?) I thought it would be great as a latte. I normally just drink whole milk but I have a stash of chocolate oat milk. Brewed this up on the stovetop with the oat milk + tea. Ugh. Not a fan of the combination. Ah well, it’s over and I move on. Luckily I still have more of this tea so while I do need to sip it down since it’s older I don’t have to end on a low note.

#tiffanydrinkstea #tiffanys2021 #tiffanysfaves #tiffanyinthe614 #tiffanysteasipdown #sipdownchallenge

From the Samurai TTB
I get the muffin part of this tea, it tastes cakey. I’m not so sure about the blueberry part, it’s more fruit tart with hibiscus. It’s not bad for a herbal, though not sure I’d want to drink a whole lot of it as there is an artificial aftertaste.

TTB. Smells strongly of blueberry, and is nice and creamy. There’s a strong buttery flavor going on. The blueberry is nice, there’s just too much hibiscus and the tartness is odd against the buttery/creamy yogurt.

STTB Tea

I would never buy this (since it contains dairy) but since it was in the TTB and the yoghurt pieces were fairly easy to pick out (with double washed hands and a spoon! I’m not a gross person I promise!) I decided to have an evening cup of herbal brew. I guess I expected this to be less acidic because I planned to add soy milk. Based on the colour and initial sip, I decided against it. I think milk would curdle.

There is a mice baked bread/buttery flavour, vanilla, and dried fruit flavour. It does taste quite a bit like blueberry and raisins. There is a nice sweetness to it. I don’t care for the acidity or the Earthy beetroot (carrot?) flavour, but neither are too bad. It would have been fine with less hibiscus though.

Sipdown! 213/365!

Hmm. I had it in my head that this was a rooibos, but it’s definitely not, so I have no recollection of drinking the first half of my sample packet! Good thing I have some left. In the bag, and brewed up, it smells like a hibiscus-forward fruit tea. Maybe a little creamy? Nothing too special. Even the initial sip is pretty much like that. But – that aftertaste. Exactly like a blueberry muffin. It doesn’t really make sense to me, but I kind of like it. Possibly enough to make another order and grab a bag of it along with some other things? (I am falling off the wagon quite hard, it seems.)

So upon smelling this, I’m detecting blueberry and buttery popcorn. Similar to if you’ve ever combined blueberry and popcorn jellybeans in your mouth as a kid to make the blueberry muffin flavor. It’s kind of weird and artificial, but smells enough like a baked muffin to make it appetizing. Steeps to a very gorgeous reddish color too.

Oh, hibiscus, why do you have to ruin so many teas that are better off without you?! The first thing I taste is the tart, almost sour flavor of the hibiscus. Definitely overpowers any lingering buttery notes, which are there in the aftertaste but only after you’re overwhelmed by how SOUR this tea is. And last time I checked, blueberry muffins are not predominantly sour. I don’t really taste a strong blueberry presence either. Overall, it’s not a BAD tea. But it could be so, so much better without the hibiscus. Can’t say I’d ever be compelled to buy this.

What a strange little blend. I can’t decide whether I think it’s really blueberry muffin or something else. Just when I’m thinking it’s something else, I get a real wave of muffin.

To be clear, in the packet the blend has a tart and pungent smell that is nothing like blueberry muffins or even blueberries. Steeped, it smells quite like hot wine to me — but I think that’s the raisins. It’s possible that I got a large clump of raisins in my spoons tonight and this might not be the same with a different mix in the spoon. The liquor is a vibrant cranberry red. Really gorgeous color. I want a sweater this color.

The flavor, as I mentioned, is somewhat sneaky. At the beginning of the sip it has a winey flavor that doesn’t make me think of blueberries at all, but by the mid-sip and finish I’m getting muffin. Not so much blueberry muffin as muffin in general. It’s a pastry-like flavor, and as it settles in, a buttery, blueberry circles around and sneaks in.

It does live up to its name, which is pretty astonishing. I give it mega-points for that, tho on the whole, it’s a bit on the heavy side for me and I think it would mostly function as a dessert substitute in my world.

This tea smells exactly like a freshly baked blueberry muffin with butter on top. It kinda tastes like a blueberry muffin as well. Yum.

Samurai TTB #16

Apparently I tried this tea at some point in the past (probably via another TTB!) but I was intrigued by it last night, as I have very fond memories of Republic of Tea’s Blueberry Bundt Cake. Unfortunately, this one is nothing like that. No blueberry and no muffin here as far as I’m concerned…just loads of tart hibiscus and a bit of creamy yogurt. Disappointing.