52teas

The leaves smell wonderful and the tea is just as good. I had it sweetened with no cream or sugar. I think this would be even better with a touch of cream.

I’m definitely going to try that tea latte recipe.

Had this hot with soy milk and sugar. Mmm…delicious. (My delivery food was 2 hours late, so I’m all out of adjectives today.)

Absolutely heavenly iced. I had it hot with a splash of cream. The coconut is the real star here, transforming plain old rooibos into a base for something delectably delicious.

Was very careful not to over-steep this today and it made a difference, but I still find this blend quite disappointing. It smells wonderful but doesn’t quite live up to expectations taste-wise. Good coconut flavour (there are real coconut pieces in the tea), but I don’t get any cream, vanilla or pie notes. It’s kind of just a coconutty black blend. Good but not great.

Received my 52Teas order over the weekend, and this one was first to try on my list. I made a pretty large mug of it, so I thought I would let it brew for a while. I think that was my first mistake… it was slightly bitter and the “cream” flavour gave off a weird aftertaste (I had the same thing happen with an earl grey cream tea I oversteeped once). Even without that, though, I wasn’t too impressed with the flavour. I will reserve judgement until I get to try it under better brewing circumstances, but my first cup was definitely disappointing!

I have not yet tried this iced. It’s delicious hot. It smells exactly like a good pina colada with real pineapple. The taste of pineapple is strong and true. When I added milk and sugar on the second infusion, the creaminess really came out to play and I thought that the faint strains of a mariachi band were emanating from my mug. A cold January night became a little bit sultry and tropical (in my mouth and heart, at least).

53teas is very strong on flavor, which makes them a favorite with me.

And tonight, in honor of spring, I tried this iced. Very nice. I made about 24 ounces and added only one brown sugar cube. Most certainly this will save so many calories! It holds up quite well; I think that the flavor “pops” more when it is hot, however.

So this is the end of the sample that Angrboda gave me and I won’t have it perfuming the inside of my dish cupboard anymore, which I have to say is a bit of a relief.

I wouldn’t buy this tea again I don’t think – it’s too perfumy and has a bit too much going on and it never really engaged me like other teas (including other 52Teas) have. I’m still glad I got the chance to try this blend and I give a big thank you to the Angry Dane for taking the time to mail it to me.

I actually drank this this morning but this is the first chance I’ve had to log it. It was pretty early so I wasn’t exactly paying much attention to the nuances of the tea but it had enough of a caffeine kick to wake me up.

There was lots of coconut shavings in this scoop of tea so I crumbled them up a little bit before I added the water to expose more of the surfaces and the flavour compounds to the tea. It seemed to work – I could see some of the coconut oil forming a bit of a slick on the surface of the cup and the coconut flavour was more pronounced than it’s been in the past – although it still doesn’t dominate the tea. The taste is also a bit less ‘perfumy’ now that I reduced the steeping time by a minute.

I added milk this time ’round and it make the tea taste sweeter, really bringing out the sweet fruit-floral flavour this tea has. Maybe a bit too much actually, as it was starting to taste quite artifical as I got closer to the bottom of the cup.

I resteeped the leaves and wasn’t impressed. The tea had little substance to it and basically tastes like light, sweet perfume.

I got this in a tea trade with Angrboda and it came with a few other teas in a large envelop. As soon as I brought it in I was all sniff sniff “What is that strange smell?” When I opened the envelop the odor became almost overpowering and I had to hold it away from my face. Let’s clear a few things up, it isn’t a bad scent, it’s a very sweet, almost floral scent, – it’s just way too strong.

Angrboda had sent me two other teas and it took me awhile to figure out which one the smell was coming from, but I eventually I figured out that it was this one. In the end I had to stick it in another cupboard because otherwise the scent would have permeated all the teas in my cabinet. It’s sitting on a shelf keeping the mugs and dishes company right now. And even though it’s in a sealed ziplock bag I smell it every time I open the cupboard. 0_o

I worked up the courage to try some today – when I poured the water in the scent actually wasn’t as bad – or maybe my scent receptors are just becoming habituated. It dulled to something that smell strong, but not kick-you-in-the-face strong, and more tea-like.

The flavour is surprisingly non-perfumy, in fact the black tea base is probably the dominent flavour I’m picking up. It’s not bad, not too bitter or astringent. The coconut is fairly faint but I am picking up the fruity-sweet date flavour. I’m not a date-hater unlike the Angry Dane (hehe) and I’ll quite happily eat dates by themselves or in baking – actually I’m a fan of most dried fruits.

The way it seems to work is that first I get some sweetness on the tip of my tongue, then the Nilgiri tea, and then the date and coconut at the very end, almost as an aftertaste. The taste isn’t objectionable, but unfortunatly this tea loses points for its obnoxious smell.

In the last 24 hours, I have slept through 16. Yeah, yesterday was a rough day. But now I feel better except for the massive headache I have from too much sleep. I will count myself lucky that it didn’t trigger a migraine though (mental note: have some white tea later as a preventative measure).

I decided to try this unfortunate little tea this morning (I have 10 minutes until noon – it is still morning) for two reasons. One, because I want to share with the husband to see what he thinks of this and Two, to try out Angrboda suggestion of using lots of milk to improve this.

I knew there was a reason I followed Angrboda. Not only does she review nifty teas (and entertainingly, too), she’s a pretty smart cookie. For my 12 oz cup of tea, I used maybe 1/3 cup of milk. No sugar since it did horrible things to this tea before. This is a massive amount of milk for me. But it worked. The tea is better. Not good mind you. Just better. It tastes like an overly mild chai now. Not super-flavorful, but at least the spices blend better. Honestly, I still can’t really taste the pumpkin. My taste buds might be defective or something because apparently it’s able to be picked out without hunting. Not sure why I miss it. Though in general pumpkin tastes pretty bland to me. I do think it is that ‘nothing’ taste I get right after the initial sweet spice. But yeah, while this is definitely better with lots of milk, I’m still kind of ‘eh’ about the whole thing.

I gave the hubby some of this and I didn’t tell him what it was – I tend not to and then like to play the game of seeing what he can pick out with zero expectations. He used to be not so great at it but in the past months he’s gotten pretty impressive. So anyway, I didn’t tell him what he was sipping on, asking for him to guess. He took a sip… “This tastes really nutmeg-y.” Another couple of sips. “Is that pumpkin or squash?” Wow. Go him. Especially since that’s the most elusive flavor for me. Then, “Didn’t you have a pumpkin pie tea at some point? Is this it?” Ding ding ding. We have a winner.

When asked what his overall thoughts are, he replied, “I can taste the flavor but I really don’t know if it belongs in tea.” He gave it an overall 2.5/5 stars and I probably have to agree with him. It’s better with the milk and I probably could up the rating based on the with-milk taste to maybe the low-40s. But I don’t think any tea should have to have that much added to it to make it nearer to tasty-ville. And the relative mildness of the spices with this much milk tells me I can’t even judge this by chai standards. So the rating stays where it is.

My first sniff of the dried leaves smelled just like canned pumpkin with a little additional spice. But sniffs after that were more… pumpkin cider. And then more of a sweet chai. I’m missing the sweet bit that I had on the first sniff. All brewed up, I get more pie spice still, but the pumpkin is back a little. I’m expecting this to be very chai-like.

The taste isn’t a strong as I expected actually and after I swallow, a few pauses later I get an expanding taste of the tea base. Also a little warm spiciness is left on my tongue. There is also a distinctly different spice taste at the front. So each sip goes sweet spice, warm spice, nothing, spicy spice, pause, pause, pause, tea. Honestly, it’s the nothing that’s throwing me off. I can’t seem to taste anything when I hold the tea in my mouth. Even swishing it around, all I taste is just a spice aftertaste. Once I swallow, I get more spice but when the tea is in my mouth, I just get the post-warmth aftertaste. It’s really really weird.

I’m wondering if the sweet taste I get at the beginning is pumpkin. Or maybe the nothing taste is really pumpkin. Either way though, it’s overpowered by the spice when I sip so I just can’t get my tastebuds to it. But it’s weird because none of the tastes seem to blend. They are all separate. Standing there independently, not glancing at or even acknowledging the other tastes there.

With half a cup left, I put a little sugar in to see if that helps any. I’ve probably put too much sugar (maybe a quarter teaspoon) so I imagine at the very least this will be sweet now… And sugar did it no favors. Sure, now there is an underlying sweetness that attempts to mush the uncooperative tastes together but having that added sweetness makes the spice and the tea flavor at the end show up as bitter. Yes, I added sugar and I taste bitterness now.

Okay, before sugar, this cup was weird. After sugar, this cup is unpleasant. But I’m going to rate this on the better of the two tastes and go with the unsweetened cup. Which means instead of being gross, this cup was just… confusing.

Needed to wake up this morning. Brewed up a huge cup of this, infused hot, four minutes, added four rocks of sugar and a tablespoon of half and half.

The aroma of the tea is toasty, a little bitter raisin smell, with a hint of cinnamon. The flavors all blend very nicely: creamy, slightly sweet, cinnamon, raisins, toasty black tea. Absolutely wonderful.

Brewed hot, no sugar, 6 minutes, added milk. This was good again. The leaves are still very fragrant and smell strongly of raisins. The brewed tea has a diluted raisin scent. The flavor is raisin, with cinnamon and the milk helps to subdue the buttery taste and make it more of a creamy tea.

Overall, decent.

This tea was very interesting. I was expecting buttered cinnamon raisin toast, and that is exactly what I got. The smell of the dried leaves is definitely black tea with raisin and a hint of cinnamon. The infused brew smells like actual toast, with cinnamon and raisins. The flavor is also good, you can actually taste buttery toasted tea with raisins and cinnamon.

I first tried the tea hot with no sugar or milk. Unfortunately, this gets a little bitter towards the end of the pot, but I thought maybe I needed sugar to help carry the sweetness.

So I tried it hot with sugar, this helped to null the bitterness I found at the end of the last pot and made the whole thing like sweetened buttery cinnamon raisin toast.

It was very good, highly recommended.

Very good. Will write review later today.

52teas has done a remarkably consistent job of producing new flavor blends that are characterized by strong, true, vivid, lively flavor. They are a real antidote to the many insipid teas out there.

The smell of the dry leaves blew me away. There’s no way that a person could distinguish this odor from a good Cinnamon Raisin bread toasted, with butter. And the taste carried through. Truly delicious, I could almost feel the toast crumbs at the side of my mouth.

I must commend 52teas for having a plethora of ingenuity when it comes to envisioning teas. They like big, bold, true tastes and I’ve yet to encounter one of their teas that had a hint of “false” or “synthetic” flavor. Their teas are consistently satisfying, rich, hearty blends that sometimes break my heart with their purity! (In a good way). Their base blacks are very high quality; strong, friendly, and adaptable.

I think you owe it to yourself to visit their web page and see what they have that grabs your attention. I have become so addicted to the weekly delivery of what promises to be an amazing tea experience, that I signed up for the 6 month subscription.
No affiliation….

I have tried this tea black and with sugar and milk. It is great both ways. The sugar and milk were nice, but it’s sweet enough on its own. The flavors are strong and true and were not overwhelmed in the least by the milk or the sugar. Excellent concoction.

Woke up and decided to deal with being 10min late to work so I could make this in the AM before my drive. Then thought I’d make it into a latte (as per 52teas recipe) thinking that the only thing better than eating your dessert before dinner is eating dessert first thing in the morning before any meals have been had. What’s even better is that although my tire blew out on the interstate when my gas tank was on E and I had to wait an hour and a half to get my tire changed with my car off for fear of running out of gas and then really looking like an idiot (and hey, it’s freezing rain outside – no I’m not going out to change it myself), I got to sit and smugly wait in my car, sipping my dessert before I even had breakfast. I highly recommend it. :)

Well, I finally got around to making a Coconut Cream Pie latte, as per 52teas recipe. First off, let me say that this may soothe my after-dinner craving for something sweet for many nights to come. :P That said, I can’t say that this would satiate a craving for coconut cream pie specifically (if I ever had one). I mean, I get the dairy/creaminess, and I get hints of coconut (and that odd hint of andes mintiness ) but do I get a mouthful of coconut cream pie? I can’t, in good conscious, say I do. Then again, do I get *bucks caramel lattes so I feel like I’m eating caramels?….No. I’d just eat caramels. Hm. At any rate, this is rather tasty (and sweet, oh sweet) and tastes totally worse for you than it truly is (hey, fat free is half the battle!) So, try this by following the 52teas recipe, but my suggestion is to add your 1 part dairy mix:1 part tea to your trusty household blender (instead of immediately pouring into your cup), blend for 30 sec on med, and then enjoy your * frothy * Coconut Cream Pie Latte. You won’t be sorry.

Hello, Steepster. It’s freezing cold and coffee and I are fighting again. The few teas I sipped between now and the last time I wrote were extremely few and far between and careless to boot – therefore not logged. But lately I’ve been turning to tea more than my coffee, so why not kick off my return with a first-time purchase through Steepster select!

First off, I’m not the biggest fan of coconut cream pie. It’s not my favorite. It’s probably not even in my top five. But I do love my black teas and I don’t mind coconut every now and again. Besides, I didn’t buy the tea for myself anyway. Lets give this a go.

Out of the pouch, the tea definitely smells of coconut. But just after the coconut hits me, so does something strongly reminiscent of Andes mints. Hmm. Chocolate and mint in my coconut cream pie tea? Then again, teas always smell different to me dry than they do steeped.

The directions say 1tsp for every 8oz of water. Since I hate winding up with watery tea, and since I have a [sub-par] pot that holds about 18fl oz without spilling over, I used 3 rounded teaspoons for all 18oz.

Nice! I definitely am getting the coconut – and I can still taste the tea, too! As it cools down, the black tea is much easier to find in each sip, but by no means overwhelms the coconut flavoring. If I concentrate on finding it, there’s definitely a dairy note in there, too – sort of a pseudo milkiness. Interesting. I wonder how they do that – perhaps its just a touch of vanilla? (Or maybe it’s just the power of suggestion tricking my brain…) Anyway, I can’t say with complete certainty that this is specifically a “Coconut Cream Pie” black tea, but the coconut is working for me, and perhaps when I get around to making a few of those lattes I’ll see what everyone is talking about. In the meantime, it was quite an enjoyable re-entry to the tea world and it feels good to be back!

For my thoughts, see: http://steepster.com/lfiske29/posts/24744

Ditto, minus the starbucks and never having had actual Coconut Cream Pie, which is delicious.

It’s been so long since I’ve had any tea!!!!!! After holiday travels to distant lands, battles with various viruses/viri, and a good heaping of “damn those people on Steepster really love their tea and while their love of tea makes Steepster possible it also makes me quite busy,” I just haven’t found myself with a nice warm cuppa in hand in quite some time.

Luckily, my gf saw our feature of 52Teas’ Coconut Cream Pie and knowing how much I love that sh** (even though we just had Strawberry Rhubarb pie) she sneakily got a pouch for us to enjoy. Now on to the tea!

I opened the pouch and was pleased to see plenty of large coconut shavings mixed throughout. The black tea seemed like a pretty good quality, albeit a little on the smaller side (I’m assuming because of the plastic pouch it travels in). What surprised me the most is the very noticeable mint smell coming out of the bag. I read the other reviews of this and nowhere do I see mention of mint, but I get a ton of that…I think it’s a natural part of the coconut (or maybe I’m just coco-nuts) – sorry.

The brew has a nice darkish browny amber-likey color a you definitely get that punch of coconut and that mint thing I mentioned. Sip time :)

Ok, I feel this is more of a coconut tea than a coconut cream pie tea. There are some more subtle cream/dairy undertones that compliment the natural flavor of the black tea, but I’m still feeling like it’s not quite a slice of coconut cream pie. Great coconut flavor though (if you’re into that, def give this a try)! I’m still getting that after-dinner mint-iness a little, which surprises me but isn’t unpleasant.

Overall, a great experience, good flavor, nice to sip. Not quite a coconut cream pie flavor explosion in your mouth, but I see the potential. I’ll definitely be trying this again soon and I will most certainly be attempting their tea latte recipe with this -it’s supposed to deliver the greatest pie flavor you can get. (speaking of that…if a certain someone happens to be reading this and they are planning to stop at the store on the way home, it would be pretty cool of them to pick up 3 (14oz) cans of fat free sweetened condensed milk :)