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Thanks to Amy Oh for a sample of this tea!

Yesterday, I had too much caffeine and I hadn’t had a run in a while so I had too much energy in my system. I thought it would be a good time to give some of this herb a try! Well, I wasn’t sure how much leaf to use to I ended up using waaay too much. Urgh.

This morning, I made it again with only 3/4 tsp of leaf for my mug. Perfect! Very herbal and cooling. And spicy! I wonder how this herb is fresh? I bet it’s awesome! Anyway, I’m a fan. :)

The temperature has dropped enough that hot tea is again a viable option. yaay! I’ve got a few teas waiting to be tried that I want to try hot before messing around with cold brewing or chilling. Give the tea some respect!

This tastes like…black tea. there’s a refreshing astringency. The texture is smooth with the barest tang of tannin. Good mellow cup. It is neither too assertive nor to weak. I have no idea how else to describe this. I can tell the quality is good and I’d serve it to company. Tastes leafy. Not the toasty autumn forest of dark oolongs, but something like that. Vaguely. It doesn’t seem strong enough to take milk too well.

I always feel like I’m missing something when I drink black teas. Few have the nuances that I love in whites and oolongs. Is it just me? I drank down the whole cup trying to figure it out. I can never discern anything special about any black tea. Perhaps I just don’t like it. I suppose I’ll keep trying anyhow. I think my next swap partner might get the rest of this pouch. :)

I think I’ll go have a cup of something caffeine free now.

I spent a good amount of time preparing various teas to chill or cold brew since its a hot weekend and we will be wanting to drink lots of cold drinks!

This particular tea I decided to brew hot and then ice. I read somewhere that fruit teas don’t cold brew well. I have my doubts about that but I only had enough to make one pitcher so I thought I’d go the safe route.

Dry, this tea smells like melony heaven. Very honeydew! Yum!

Hot, this tea just tastes mostly like hot apple. After chilling this tastes more like sweet melon but still pretty strongly of dried apple pieces. I don’t really like the taste of dried apple pieces. Other than that this tea is definitely very summery and melony. I don’t think I like this enough to get more but it is definitely tasty. Could be good as a liquid for aqua fresca.

Husband has already consumed more than half a pitcher. Good thing I made all those other teas cold brew style!

Intriguing tea. The white base here is of the stronger more robust variety, bordering on woody. I cold brewed mine. I can imagine that this one is sensitive to oversteeping with hot water. The base is also a bit like dark chocate which pairs nicely with the vanilla. It’s a very smooth and sweet vanilla. Very pleasant! Unfortunately, the grapefruit part of this tea is quite lacking. The flavor shows up only in the after taste and lingers in a bad way. Like cheap air freshener. But it’s faint so it’s not so bad.

Over all this is a pleasant tea to go with sweets. I probably won’t get more but I’ll enjoy it while I have it. Might try putting some citrus zest in at some point to highlight the grapefruit. I do think a vanilla citrus combo can be quite nice.

I like to keep a pot or pitcher of tea in the fridge in hot weather season. It hasn’t really bee all that hot, which means the iced teas aren’t as refreshing as intended but they are still tasty.

I’ve learned to make my peace with hibiscus. It just needs to be iced. This particular tea intrigued me because of the cinnamon. Another reviewer mentioned that it tasted like Christmas and I completely agree! There’s actually a popular German Christmas tea that tastes a lot like this. I can drink this straight once diluted, but husband preferred it full strength with a dollop of honey. I love that it tastes like fruit punch and cinnamon. Quite a good fruit tea.

As others have said, this is definitely an oolong. Perhaps they meant to call it a green oolong tea. I don’t know. But whatever it’s supposed to be called, this is good stuff. After seeing all those rave reviews on this tea, I just had to buy myself a pouch.

The first thing you smell upon opening the pouch is a lovely minerally condensed milk. The leaves are dark green and crumpled into messy little balls, as is the case with most green oolongs I’ve had. The liquor is a lightly colored and totally delicious. It’s creamy and milky and smooth and green and good. There’s a slight melon-y fruitiness as well.

After the first steep, the leaves get huge but are clearly capable of another infusion. Smells like it’s about to get vegetal! I’ll report back on how that goes. :)

Steep 2: Yes, this is definitely a bit vegetal now, but not much. The flavor here also reminds me of papaya. Still sweet and creamy but not so milky as the first steep.

This is a lovely tea, whether it be a green or an oolong.

Knowing that my mom is a fan of ginseng and fun new teas, I brought this sample packet home to share with my family. So we made a cup then got distracted by doggies. I think this cup steeped about 10 minutes. So it’s a bit strong, but not bitter or astringent at all! good stuff! My mom and dad were sipping it and going, “I don’t taste any ginseng.” I couldn’t really taste the ginseng either. Then the cup cooled and I tasted it. The ginseng is a slight cooling bitterness in the back of your throat. Very pleasant.

The oolong itself is a very roasty grainy type. It’s not really my thing, to be honest. But I think the quality is really good despite my personal preferences. :) any tea that doesn’t get bitter and astringent when you get distracted is good in my book.

Okay, my third attempt at this tea. Cold brewed it for a good 1.5 days and it is great cold brewed. The spiciness becomes minimal. It feels a bit more like fizziness than spiciness. The mango is there and the funky green tea is barely noticeable. Refreshing and interesting. Might make a good base for lemonade!

Finally getting to another sample from Fong Mong! This is really good! I didn’t really expect such a toasty flavor. The smell and tast is like oats but also green like my favorite green oolongs. Usually the roasty ones are darker but this one is definitely green. I really like this unusual combo!

I don’t have time to get into details here, but I’m really enjoying this! While the toastyness is novel and fun, I think I still prefer the unroasty green oolongs. I guess I wouldn’t buy this one, but it’s still really tasty.

Edit: second steep. Roasted veggies!

Oh my. oh my oh my. I am somewhat speechless. This is … wow. I feel like I’m drinking the soul of lilacs, young grass, ripe juicy peach and plum. It is the bounty of Mother Earth coming to life even as the last patches of snow are melting away. The taste lingering on your tongue is exquisite. I don’t know if I want to keep drinking this tea or just savor that peachy flavor in my mouth. There’s also something like apple.

I’ve been drinking Tieguanyin all my life, but this is different from any other I’ve had. Is is fair to put this tea in the same category? I suppose this is the freshest tieguanyin I’ve ever had. Picked this very season! I wonder what the leaves tastes like fresh off the plant?

The leaves are much greener than other tieguanyin as well. The smell of the tea was so vegetal at first I was a bit put off. But the flavor of the tea really takes a few sips to unfold. Then you slowly realize what a treasure you have in your cup.

Lovely.