Andrews & Dunham Damn Fine Tea

I received this sample a while ago from yssah – Love is Tea (LIT). I wanted to give this a try before purchasing a large tin. I am a huge fan of Andrews & Dunham Damn Fine Tea. I have almost all of the tins, save 3 of them.

Anyway on to Mount Gray. I LOVE Earl Grey teas. This one is definitely in my top 5 now. The bergamot isn’t very strong or overpowering, which some Earl Greys tend to be. This is well blended. The tea itself brews rather dark and strong even below 3 minutes. It has a slight astringency to it. The base is warm and toasty but strong enough to counteract the bergamot. Good blend. It is different than the others I have tried.

Always good when you want a bit of tea with your smoke and milk.

It’s here, it’s here, it’s here, IT’S HERE. It’s finally here!

I was so excited for this blend. It was a great Christmas gift (to myself, ha ha), it was waiting in my mailbox when I got home from Christmas.

I have been away for a few days. Drank a lot more coffee than I should have. There was no real good way to drink tea where I was, microwaved or keurig warmed water. So I had a bit of Keurig earl grey, but mostly coffee. So to come home to this tea was a blessing.

The dry tea smells deliciously strong, malty, sweet.

The brewed tea is just unbelievable. These guys have to be magic or something. The tea is thick and bold but not astringent or bitter. It is smooth, super smooth, like liquid silk. It is malty, but there are also hints of cocoa. When people writer about wanting a tea that is like hot chocolate, this is the tea you need. It is sweet and a little but earthy. The flavours are bright and distinctive. It is creamy. I generally don’t add milk and sweetener to my black teas, but I don’t think this one would need it anyway.

So happy to have this one in my hoard.

I started the month of April with 95 black teas on my shelves.
26 of those are in various boxes from various friends. The other 69 are actually teas in my collection. (These numbers don’t include flavored blacks, BTW). My goal every month is to drink every tea in my collection at least once. It never happens, of course, because I have way too much tea to ever be able to pull that off! However, so far this month I feel pretty good about my progress! Of the black teas in my personal collection, I’ve drank all but 21 of them, & of the tea trades I’ve drank all but 16, for a total of 58 out of 95, which I think is about 55% (if I remember the math formula correctly). Maybe I can get it to 75% by the end of wednesday….

This is nice black blend, probably my least favorite of the damn fine teas, but still very tasty & worthy of being enjoyed.

This is the type of tea I can drink with breakfast, which I did today.
It’s not the type of tea I could drink on an empty stomach, the brightness of the brew would not bode well for me.
But with breakfast, it’s great!

My A&D order arrived yesterday. I restocked Tiger, Double Knit, & Caravan, & of course I had to get some of this as well.
Gotta try ALL the teas!
So, although I’m still a super taster for bitterness (not as bad as yesterday at least), I enjoyed this cup. It’s very bright, as in the shrill-ness of a flute, or possibly a piccolo, but it isn’t all high end. There is a deep substance to it as well, & although I can tell you without a doubt that this would not be a good before-breakfast-tea for me, it IS a good afternoon pick-me-up type tea.
Damn Fine Tea
I love saying that :D

This arrived at work the same time as my Kickstarter KLiP, so of course I had to steep a batch right away.

Only problem is that I am sick and my taste buds are completely shot.

Will try again later.

I don’t usually appreciate smokey teas much, mainly because those that I had used massive amounts of smokey flavouring to cover the taste of poor quality tea. This sample, from the kind and wonderful Terri, surprised me. It’s not overpoweringly smokey, but more in the range of Keemun smokey. It also has a sweetness, and even a slight nuttiness to it. Very nice, although I probably wouldn’t go out of my way to stock it. This is more a matter of personal preference than a matter of the tea being of poor quality. By all means, if you like smokey teas, this one is probably a must. Thank you for the experience Terri! Even though this was a sip down, I may try to resteeep what I have, just to see how it resteeps.

cough i tried. and failed. Sorry Cavo! Not to worry the remaining part of your sample will go to a good home. While i love the base in this, as i do most of the A&D teas, i just cannot get past that whole bergamot thing. this is not a kinda sort of EG…THIS IS AN EG! BOLD! IN YOUR FACE! not for Sil… heh glad to have gotten to try it and make sure though :)

This is a sample sipdown and thank you again JustJames for sending me this lovely tea.
It took me several steeps but I can by now really appreciate why people around are loving so much.
The last cup was the best one for me and the sadest as it is now gone.

with this steeping parameter, this is perfect !
Loved it
Thank you JustJames for sharing

I was expecting this one for a long time now…I remember all (almost !) Terri’s notes about this tea and the picture of this proud and bold Tiger inside a tea circle…I love the pic, would I love the tea ?

JustJames kindly sent me a sample of this precious assam, thank you so much to introduce this tiger in my kitchen. This is an assam so I was a little worried, sometimes some of them are just too bold, too strong for me especially because of bitterness.
I stupidely left it steep more than 4 minutes because I was baking an ham and olive cake…I generally let assams steeping for 2 minutes not more.

This is too bitter for me but it’s my fault. Having said that i know that with 2 min steeping I will love because even if I find it too bitter for me, it’s not so bitter and I love the maltyness and the depth taste of this assam.
It’s midnight here – yes I’m crazy to drink an assam at midnight especially this one ! I’m sure this is a tea I would like with a splash of milk as well and particularly on the morning for sure.

I’ll make another try tomorrow with a shorter steep.

I always used to drink all my tea without embellishment. Black, green, herbal, straight up. Then I had surgery and all I wanted during my recovery was tea with lots and lots of honey in it.

Now I’m drinking some teas plain again. This one definitely makes a good start for that. When Erik and Charles say that the Red-Tailed Hawk is “bright” I take this to mean that the flavors can stand on their own, without the aid of sweet or milky things. That’s refreshingly true in this case.

This is a big, bold Assam that doesn’t waste time trying to be subtle – very tiger-like. It has that characteristic malt flavour that leaves an aftertaste on my tongue that makes me think of burnt sugar. It’s a bit on the astringent for me to be really wild about this one and oddly enough it doesn’t seem to go well with milk, which is unusual for this type of tea.

I’ve tried other Assams that I liked more, if I’m honest. I might be alone in my opinion given other people’s ratings, but I’d consider this to be a good, but not fantastic tea.

Sipdown!! (121)

Thank you Cavocorax! This is actually the last of the tea from our first swap and though I think it is a good EG, I just don’t love the taste of bergamot enough to order more. It is quite pleasant though for those that do like bergamot.

After Tiger Assam and I did not get along, I was worried that I would have issues with this one as well. I am not really sure why I thought that given all teas are different but I did. However, Cavocorax was kind enough to share this with me so I thought it was at least worth a taste. Well, it would seem I was worrying for nothing because this was a rather tasty cup. Given that I did not realize it was an Earl Grey, I was quite shocked to discover the bergamot in my cup but it is there and it is prominent. I don’t know if this is something I would reach for often but it is a nice cup for right now. Thank you Cavocorax for sharing this with me :)

Argh. Steepster keeps eating my note.

Short version: Great tea. Happy that it’s kept it body and flavor even after 7+ years in my cupboard. Made a pot today and enjoyed as much as ever.

Another tea that I’ve held on to for years and years because I love it and don’t want it to be gone. Yes, I know that sentence makes no sense one you stop to think about it, but we’re not talking about that right now. We’re talking about this wonderfully rich and malty tea that’s full of raisin, crusty bread, and cocoa notes. It. is. so. good. I made a pot of it to go with breakfast this morning, and I’m happy I did. Even though this tea is 7+ years old, it’s held up incredibly well. I feel like it’s as full bodied as I remember, and I don’t pick up on any dusty notes that sometimes happen with older teas. Thank goodness!

I have enough leaves left for one more pot. I won’t hold on to them for another seven years. Pinky promise.

Tea of the morning. I live in central New Jersey, so I woke up expecting #Blizzard2015 to be outside my door. We received maybe two inches of snow. Two inches. That said, if you live in New England be safe! The storm does look nasty.

The powers that be had already cancelled school, so the kids and I enjoyed a long leisurely breakfast while we planned out our day and laughed at the weathermen. I made a big pot of this tea, and everyone enjoyed it. Even my son, who is not a hot tea drinker, had a cup. It was deliciously malty and thick today with nice fruity note.

Looks like we might head over to the arcade for a while. It won’t be packed and absolutely insane with all of the schools being closed and next to no snow on the ground. Right? Oy. :)

I have had so many cups of this tea over the past week or so. I made pots of it when friends came over. I made cups for myself when I needed a comfort cuppa. I’ve made this fairly weak, and I’ve been distracted and left the leaves steeping for ten minutes or so. No matter what this has been exactly what it claims to be – damn fine.

Everyone I offered this to enjoyed it. Some drank it with milk and sugar, but my favorite way to drink this right now is plain. It’s malty, super duper rich, and has great fruity notes. When I let the tea steep too long I did add some cream because, um, strong.

I am down to my last few servings of this, so an A&D order is imminent. There must always be a tiger in my cupboard.