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I figured I should hurry up and try these taster pouches that I ordered from 52teas while some of them are still available for purchase. This one sounded too intriguing to pass up, especially when I tend to enjoy candy cane teas. There are even some little candy cane pieces mixed in with the dry leaf!

I shortened the steep a bit from my last marshmallow genmaicha blend, because I find myself to not be the biggest fan of the green tea used in these. It tends to have more of a rough, dry grass sort of flavor rather than a fresh one. So I was hoping a shorter steep would mellow it out a little. (As I say that, I notice that the pouch calls for a 2-minute steep. Clearly I should pay attention to these things rather than going on autopilot…)

It’s fairly tasty. I think the peppermint flavor and the level of peppermint is ideal, it has a nice fresh candy cane taste without being overwheming. I think I can taste the marshmallow and vanilla a little bit more than in the previous genmaicha? But it’s hard to say, since the mintiness probably detracts from it just a bit. I definitely get the toasty rice, nom.

It’s fun and festive! But probably not one that I’ll reorder, given that I already have a candy cane tea from B&B and am planning on purchasing a green rooibos version from Simpson & Vail sometime soon.

365 Days of Tea Challenge – Day 20

Okay, serious business! I’ve heard amazing things about this tea, so now it’s time to try it myself. I am both a banana lover and a pancake lover, so this tea was made for me!

You guys, this is just stupidly good… I mean, come on.

To me, it tastes closer to banana bread, as there’s definitely a distinct nuttiness that suggests walnuts or pecans. It has a lovely bready or cakey flavor! The banana is super duper natural-tasting, and it’s definitely a sweet, ripe banana. Personally, I prefer greener bananas for eating, but for banana bread it’s spot-on!

Now, don’t get me wrong, there’s definitely some maple syrup slathered over this particular banana bread. Or maybe it’s banana bread turned French toast! Yep, I’m going with banana bread French toast.

Regardless, it’s delicious. Smooth, sweet, maple-y, cakey, decadent banana bread goodness.

Now I’m just mad that this isn’t a permanent blend and I only have a 15g taster. I’m mad, Anne! :P

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bs3TeeMFPC1/

Swap Sample Sipdown! (38)

Another Lupicia sample from Kawaii433! Their Melon Oolong is one of my most beloved teas, so of course I had to try the white tea version.

The melon definitely works very well with this base as well. The white tea has nice creamy oat notes, and they meld with the melony goodness to form a sort of melon milkshake flavor.

Personally, I think I prefer the oolong version as it has a bit more juicy punch, and I don’t feel the need to stock both versions. But this is really tasty as well, and I’m very happy that I got to try it. Thank you, Kawaii! :)

Swap Sample Sipdown! (37)

Mystery sample! This one is from Arby and is labeled “Japanese Sencha 2018”. I quite like Japanese green teas, though I haven’t been drinking many lately. I do have quite a pile of unopened sample packets from Yunomi to get through eventually… This one looked as though it had some stems mixed in as well as leaves.

This is perfectly tasty! It has a nice vegetal spinach flavor with a lot of sweetness. There’s a tiny bit of pleasant bitterness creeping up after a 1-minute steep. I also taste some nice and somewhat creamy grain notes.

It’s not terribly complex for a sencha, but it’s very enjoyable nonetheless!

Swap Sample Sipdown! (36)

Thanks again to VariaTEA for sending this one!

Unfortunately, this just never materialized for me. I sort of get where it’s trying to go with the marshmallow idea, but to me this mostly just tastes like a mediocre genmaicha with maybe a slight suggestion of vanilla.

I think I may order a sampler packet when it’s back in stock, just to see what it’s like when it’s fresh…

365 Days of Tea Challenge – Day 19

So today, I went to The Steeping Room in Austin for a lovely early afternoon tea! Unfortunately, the tea that I had does not appear to be available for sale on their website, so I’m putting the note here (under Random Steepings) instead.

I ended up having three different teas while I was there. The first two were the Noble Concubine (gui fei) oolong, and the White Tea #18, which is a Taiwanese white tea. The third tea was a resteep of my boyfriend’s Milk Oolong. At The Steeping Room, the servers present you with the wet tea leaves on a small dish along with the steeped tea, and they’ll resteep the same leaves multiple times if you simply ask.

The gui fei was very tasty! It had yummy sweet dried fruit and honey notes along with a very light floral and peach aftertaste. The white tea was less memorable for me, and I couldn’t find much complexity in it. It tasted much as I would expect for a generic white tea – like hay and oats. I was surprised, since the description mentions eucalyptus and camphor notes, which I didn’t find at all. The (unflavored) milk oolong was smooth and silky with a lovely peaches ‘n’ cream sort of flavor. I drank the second steeping, which was just as flavorful as the first.

For food, I had a duo of scones. Their scones are some of my favorite menu items, as I feel they’re very well-made. This time, I chose the Cranberry Walnut and Mixed Berry Spelt scones. Though I felt there was too much walnut in the cranberry scone, it was still very tasty, especially with the included honey butter. The spelt scone was delicious, and reminded me of a fluffy biscuit with mixed berries inside!

For some reason, I decided I should also get dessert! I got the Flourless Chamomile Almond Torte, which was beautifully textured and delicious. It was plated with fresh fruit and drizzled with honey. I was so full of tea and food at this point that I brought half of my dessert home with me!

Anyway, I would highly recommend The Steeping Room to anyone who might find him or herself in Austin! Price-wise, it’s a little bit on the higher side, but I feel the quality is worth it.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bs1ElRKlqFH/

Swap Sample Sipdown! (35)

This is one of several teabento samples that VariaTEA was kind enough to send me. Thank you! ❤

In my past tea life, dianhongs were some of my favorite teas, and especially the fuzzy golden ones. So this one is right up my alley! I love the animal associations with these teas, they’re so cute and this one is indeed golden as a lion’s mane. Plus the image of a lion with a curly mane is amusing to me… Perm gone wrong?

Yum, this is smooth and delicious. It has those lovely creamy, malty sweet potato and honeyed bread notes that I would expect from a golden dianhong. There are also some mellow earthy flavors that, for me, are a hallmark of Chinese black teas. On the lighter side, I taste fleeting notes of nectarine and fuzzy apricot, along with a clear and lingering sweetness.

Yummy, love it! I know I also have some unopened dianhong samples from TeaVivre, so it’ll be interesting to compare those with this experience and explore the style a little more.

Sample Sipdown! (34)

Whoa, there must have been a lot of blackberry leaf in the bottom of this sample packet, because this is way sweet. In fact, it’s too sweet.

The buttery and creamy caramel is still enjoyable, but the overly sweet quality of it is making me rethink my plans to order a full-size pouch of this one…

Hmm, what to do…

Swap Sample Sipdown! (33)

I was thrilled to find a great selection of unflavored oolong samples in my swap package from Kawaii433! I’ve been digging straight oolong lately for some reason, so it’s amazing to have so many to try. Thank you Kawaii, you’re the best! ❤

Of course, I have to try this one first. I absolutely love the sticky rice oolong from David’s Tea, and that’s saying something, as I don’t generally find David’s blends to be all that good. So I’m very excited to try another sticky rice oolong from a source that specializes more in straight teas!

As expected, this is friggin’ fantastic! It has a splendid sweet and sticky rice flavor that makes my heart go pitter-patter. But there’s also more complexity than just that. There’s lashings of butter and cream and even sweet corn and popcorn notes. Of course it’s deliciously silky smooth, which when combined with the sweet and creamy notes makes it almost custard-like in flavor. I would even go so far as to say I taste a hint a vanilla in here, though that’s probably just the sweet cream flavor tricking me!

And, of course, that’s not the end either. There’s a satisfying nuttiness that goes beyond rice, perhaps suggesting cashew or macadamia nut. And underneath all of the luxurious, almost dessert-like flavors, soft floral and gentle stonefruit notes that linger on the tongue long after the end of the sip.

So rice! Much wow!

Swap Sample Sipdown! (32)

This one is a bonus sample given to me by tea-sipper!

I had no idea Easter egg nests are also a thing in the UK! In the States I often see them made with chow mein noodles. Now that I’m thinking about it, I really want to eat some! XD

This is mostly just a chocolate black tea with a bit of added toastiness from the rice. I don’t really get marshmallow, though there were three mini marshmallows in my infuser, and they all melted fairly well.

Chocolate teas often taste somewhat thin to me, almost watery. This one does suffer from that a bit, and the base tea is not flavorful enough to make up for it. But that’s okay, this was a limited tea so I’m somewhat relieved to not be in love with it!

I think I would have enjoyed this more if it had a larger proportion of genmaicha to it, as the black tea doesn’t seem to be adding much here.