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I received this tea as a sample from Ost. It’s a good black tea, though now that I’ve found out that it is discontinued, it makes me a bit sad. For a plain black tea, I do think I prefer Whispering Pines’ Jabberwocky, just because it seems to have more flavor. This tea smells sweet – like raisins and spices – but when I brewed it, the sweetness of the dry tea didn’t transfer. It smells a bit smoky, but not overwhelmingly so. It’s more mild than I would like, but still enjoyable.

This is another sample from Veronica – I really hope I didn’t mix up the tea samples… Anyway, this is another sweet smelling tea – not artificially sweet, but something like raisins and vanilla. I probably steeped this one too long too, but it smells lovely.

It isn’t very bitter, now that I’ve taken a sip of it. There’s a hint of vanilla and fruitiness that I can’t quite distinguish as any particular fruit. I don’t have enough experience with fruit tea yet. Either way, it’s pleasant. There’s also an astringent note, though not in your face. I don’t know if I would buy it, but it is good.

I received this sample from Veronica. It smells lovely, though right now I’m still waiting or it to cool. I don’t have much experience with wine. At first I thought it smelled lemony, but now I smell the grape. It does kind of smell like grape juice (scuppernong, not niagara).
I did brew it a bit too long, I think. It’s kind of bitter. I’ll probably brew it again later so that I can leave a rating. I used too much water and steeped it too long this time.

I chose this tea at random, because I was able to add an extra sample if I posted on facebook. I wanted to try a coconut tea, and I realized I didn’t have much experience at all with spiced teas. This smells like a normal chai, but milder because of the ceylon (or at least I heard the chai teas were mixed with ceylon… I could be wrong. It just says black tea on the page…) And the coconut makes it sweet. The predominant flavor, though, is the lemon grass. it’s great. I’m wondering if it will go well with caramel. Anyway, I think I’ll brew some more. This seemed to brew the best, though, so maybe I should use more chai tea per cup and brew it longer.

I just received this tea as well as a few others in the mail today. I opened it to smell it first, and found it did smell similar to cream soda as others have said, but I think the tea smells more like yogurt covered raisins. The tea does look like the picture. I’m not drinking this tea plain, but mixing it with two other teas; 1/2 tsp Cream, 1/2 tsp Summer Rose, and 1/4 tsp Cherry. I will rate the tea separately, of course, but I wanted to try all three. I think they should mix well enough together. This rating will inevitably include all three, so I won’t rate the tea until I drink it separately. Since all three teas have a ceylon base, I should at least get a good feel for the black tea.

Right now, it doesn’t smell heavily of any of the teas, which is good in my opinion, since the cherry has such a strong flavor. You can smell all of the teas, though. It smells like a sweet floral with a hint of cherry. The predominant flavor is rose, with a hint of cherry. I don’t know if I taste the cream yet. I will try adding milk and sugar to my next cup to see how it affects the taste, though I will probably not add it to this page. I will have to try the cream tea by itself, since it doesn’t seem to have a very noticeable flavor at the moment.

I will post a more practical review later.

I received a sample of this tea from The Cookie Lady. I haven’t yet tried anything from Whispering Pines Tea Company, but I’ve been wanting to, so I was excited about trying this tea as well as the Mountain Nectar tea that I received. I like the flavor of this tea, though I doubt I could easily describe it. It’s complex, and both fruity and toasty. I wouldn’t say it’s very bitter. I’ve tried a few teas described as tasting like plum, so based on similarity, I could say that it does taste like plum – or at least it has a comparable taste to other teas that are described as tasting like plum… All I know is that I like it, and find it more agreeable than some of my other black teas. I’m steeping the tea a second time, but I knew I liked the tea the first time I drank it. I need to buy Whispering Pines teas, so I think I’ll put this on my shopping list.

I got about an ounce of this in the mail recently, because I feel like I don’t have enough oolong, and I wanted to try purple tea, so this kills two birds with one stone. I’m sampling it now, so I can buy more if it turns out I like it. It smells like licorice at first, or at least that’s what I think when I first smell it – but today everything smells like licorice, so when I smell it again, I realize that it does not in fact smell like licorice. I can’t describe it. After brewing it for the amount of time stated on the bag, it has that sweet potato scent – more of a hint than full fledged baked potato. It’s a lovely color closer to a black tea. I tend to prefer black teas, so I enjoy oolongs that are closer in flavor to black tea. It does taste sweet, or perhaps it’s just that it isn’t particularly bitter. It has an earthy taste. I don’t taste plum or anything particularly fruity, though I do like this oolong. I don’t have enough experience to give this tea a rating but I think this is one of the better oolongs that I’ve drunk.

I received this tea from Carol Who in a Christmas card – or this is most likely the tea that I received. It has a lovely smell that permeates the bag, though for some reason everything smells like licorice today. It could be because of the cold I’m getting. Steeping the tea makes it smell like a ginger cookie. It smells so sweet. I like that ginger has this natural sweetness to it, with just a bit of spice. I’m new to spiced teas. I haven’t really tried boiling spiced teas with milk yet, but I think I’ll get around to it. It might be good in warmed apple juice. I should figure out how to do that – maybe I could boil/simmer the tea in apple juice. I wish there was more ginger. I like that the ginger and citrus work well together. At least, that is what I’m tasting right now. Next time I’ll try it with milk to see how that adds or detracts from the flavor.

So, I took my own advice and brewed fresh tea. The tea is darker this time with a warm scent that reminds me of caramel. It tastes better too, though I wouldn’t say that the vanilla is as prominent as I would like. The Earl Grey is there, but not as strong as I would like. The citrus notes are stronger, now that I can taste the tea. I did wonder how the added citrus would affect the taste. I don’t know if I like this addition or not. It’s not the best vanilla earl grey I’ve tasted, but it would probably add more depth to whatever you decided to add it to. It does taste more like orange than bergamot.

Taste: 7 (It does have the vanilla and Earl Grey elements there, but the orange peel seems to be the predominant flavor. That’s not necessarily what I want in my Earl Grey, but it’s not like it doesn’t meld with the other flavors. I do think the taste balances out as it cools, giving it a stronger flavor. I might have to try it iced.)
Tea Leaf: 6 (It doesn’t match the picture. It’s a lot more dust than I would expect, and not what I would call whole leaf. It looks cut like what you would get in a tea bag. the cornflower and orange peel are there, but not in big pieces.)
Smell: 7 (Prior to steeping, I didn’t really get much of an Earl Grey vibe off of it, and it didn’t really smell like vanilla. Since those are the two things that I would look for, I was a bit disappointed that it wasn’t noticeable. Brewed, it has a caramel smell, which could be the mix of vanilla and creme.
Would I drink it again: 7 (I think it would be great mixed. I’m getting a sample of it in the mail, and I don’t think I would buy it immediately, but if I had it in the closet, I would drink it. It’s good to share with friends who are on the fence about tea.)
How it compares to similar teas: 5 (It doesn’t beat out any of the competitors, unless you include the bagged varieties. It’s good for what it is, but I’ll buy my cream earl grey teas elsewhere, and reserve this for blends.)
Would I recommend it to others: Yes +5 / No 0
Total: (37×2) 74
(Still working on this rating thing. I should stop rating them simply based on the smily faces at the bottom…)

I received this sample from Flyawaybirdie in a Christmas card. I only started looking at Adagio recently, or looking at it again. I knew there were fan mixes, and so I wanted to get something that reminded me of one of my favorite characters, but then ended up not wanting any of them for the ingredients mixed in. Offer too many choices, then it becomes that much easier to be indecisive or picky about the ingredients. Anyway, I did buy some teas to sample and one of the teas I wanted to try was the Earl Grey Moonlight.

I love vanilla in Earl Grey, which is funny because I just assumed I wouldn’t like vanilla because of my aversion to vanilla candles. I realize now that one doesn’t really influence the other.

This tea doesn’t seem to have a strong smell of anything. I get a hint of vanilla, but it almost reminds me of licorice allsorts or anise flavored cookies. I don’t know why exactly.

I feel like I’m brewing the tea wrong, though. I don’t get much of a flavor from the tea. It’s a bit muted, and tastes vaguely of black tea and bergamot. I brewed it first in a larger traveller mug, and I don’t think I used enough tea. I reused the same tea bag, so I might need to use fresh tea to really get the flavors. I think I just used too much water. So I’ll try again in a few minutes with more tea. I’m really glad I participated in the tea swap.