August Uncommon Tea

Everyone should have tea friends who order samples and split them with you! Huge thanks to my friend Elizabeth for an opportunity to try 3 new-to-me August Uncommon teas. :) This one may have been my favorite of the bunch. It’s super rich and malty with chocolatey undertones. No bitterness or astringency and re-steeps beautifully! Wouldn’t mind adding this one to my cupboard.

I remember really liking this one the last time I had it, and my rating seems to support that. What I don’t remember is the heat/spice of the chili pepper being so strong! I drank this one pretty late at night while rewatching Thumeblina on Disney+ (the soundtrack was so much better than I remember it being)! and I found myself almost panting at points because the heat of the chili was so intense with each sip. It works really well with the more dark cocoa like notes and black tea and if the goal was a Mexican Hot Chocolate sort of vibe then I think it was totally achieved!

So far this is my favourite from my most recent AU order; though I still have several new samples to go through…

I love the slight bitterness of this rich dark chocolate paired with a sweet, warming cinnamon. The mild heat of chilli in the back of the throat is not to be missed, and it’s that note which adds a complexity that sets this apart from other chocolate chilli blends I’ve sampled!!

I’m glad I didn’t read reviews of this tea before I purchased a sample of it, as it seems pretty hated across the board. Cardamom and tobacco were extremely intriguing, and I get absolutely none of either. This is definitely charcoal level smoke, and extremely medicinal. Quite a strange blend, but I don’t entirely hate it.

I just finished off my sample size and purchased another bag. The cocoa and anise is so well-balanced, and such an interesting combination, I’ve found myself craving the flavor combo recently. August Uncommon posted a recipe for an affogatto using this tea, and I’m very interested in trying it. I’ll have to grab some vanilla ice cream next time I’m at the store.

This is an interesting one! The anise smell was extremely strong, and continued to be prominent when it was first brewed. As the cup cooled, the anise settled, and I was left with a cup of smooth malted chocolate. Really nice nighttime tea!

Sipdown (1151)!

This grew on me a little bit over time, but it’s something I’m mostly pretty relieved to be finished with – especially because my rooibos/herbal tea sample drawer is so full right now that I can hardly close/open it. It was mostly creamy pistachio in this cup, but it always has a menthol peppermint note and is a bit too apple-y/fruity to work all fit together nicely. Long steeps are better though – more pistachio/almond.

Still smells weird before it’s steeped, but the taste is growing on me a lot. Creamy/minty flavour combinations really seem to be my jam right now and that’s sort of what’s going on here, but with the added layer of a rich nuttyness as well and just a hint of something floral. I find it more complex as a blend than it needs to be, but well balanced at its core.

Another new AU blend.

This seems like a strange combination of ingredients, but AU does have a magical way of making flavours that seems contrary taste good when mixed together. The dry leaf aroma was, admittedly, pretty bad though. Definitely nutty and minty, but the mint had a very herbaceous and muddy note to it and I just felt like that meant the cup was going to taste the same way…

It’s weird though because I feel like the taste of this tea is almost entirely different from how it smelled. It’s still very minty but a much softer and creamier more, much more akin to a candy cane type of mint over the actual herb. It’s also nutty, but like a pistachio creme over raw or roasted pistachios. I was kind of shocked at the difference from smell to taste but I liked the blend a lot in the end. Though, it does feel a little bit Christmas-y.

One of the main reasons for placing my most recent August Uncommon order (aside from not being able to sleep at 2am), was to try this tea. I absolutely love violet. I grew up enjoying C.Howard’s violet gum and candies, so violet is a flavor/fragrance that I gravitate towards. The dry leaf and brewed aroma is like walking through a field of violets and blackberry bushes. Sticky sweet floral berry divinity. There’s an almost lychee quality to it. The mouthfeel is like silk. The flavor is unreal. I did add 1 raw sugar cube, but it didn’t need it. It’s sticky sweet, and packed full of violet flavor. The berry flavoring combines perfectly with the floral, and the lapsang is barely there, but present enough to tie everything together. This blend is a stunner.

I’m actually pretty sad to be out of this one. The prune and white chocolate notes worked so well together, and I found it so easy to drink.

I placed another August Uncommon order and it just arrived. I’m slowly making my way through their entire catalogue. I was intrigued by the inspiration, and was very excited for this particular blend to arrive. The dry leaf smells exquisite- creamy, with hints of stone fruit, and cherry. I didn’t care for the smell while it was brewing, it was very medicinal. I also didn’t care for the first few sips. Way too boozy and very medicinal. However, as it cooled the flavor really developed, and the creaminess and fruit flavors melded wonderfully. I couldn’t stop drinking it for some reason.

From earlier this week.

I have a mug warmer from VariaTEA that I love, but it lives in the kitchen right now for my tea to sit on when I’m doing dishes or cooking – I love having it there, but I also really want to try and find a place for it in my room because quite often I make a mug of tea to drink during a TV show and then I get engrossed in the show and forget about the tea.

Such is the case here, where I made a mug and then got a little too into my Fruits Basket binge. When I finally came back to the mug, it was lukewarm and not as good as it could have been. The flavour is already a little strange in the blend in the first place; it’s quite herbal mint/eucalyptus tasting while still having the cooling menthol element. The dragonfruit is present, but not juicy or necessarily sweet. Recently I was doing some tea and flavour pairing exercises for work and I looked at doing Cold 911 and Watermelon, and what I realized happens is that the sweetness of the watermelon gets sucked out of the fruit, and instead the cooling and herbaceous elements of the mint/eucalyptus combo are drastically amplified. I bet that’s what’s happening here…

Another new AU blend – this is an older one, but I never got around to trying it. Presumably because I wasn’t interested in it for the green tea base? I tossed it into this order anyway though…

Not sure where I land here. It reminds me an awful lot of Capri, which is another AU blend that has a melon/mint profile. I didn’t like that blend very much, nor do I like the melon/mint flavour combination in general. I get that it’s meant to be cooling and refreshing, but it also feels somewhat medicinal to me. That’s not helped here, because the eucalyptus borders on that Vick’s Vapor Rub type of flavour profile. However, there is also this tropical sweetness that lingers that almost makes the flavour pairing worthwhile!?

It’s certainly unique, but I need to try it again to see if that really overlaps with it also being good.

Iced Tea Sipdown (1076)!

I kept my steep time a little bit shorter for this iced tea and the result was a smoother infusion with dark, full bodied and round coffee/espresso notes and less of that almost sourness to the roast that I got in some earlier cup of this. Not really a “sweet” coffee flavour either, but sweeter than it’s been in the past. Easy sipping!

Cold Brew!

I wasn’t crazy about this one last time I had it, but it seems I find a good way to enjoy it. I cold brewed this one, using less leaf and for a bit of a shorter time that I would typically leave a cold brew to go – I was hoping for a milder coffee/malt flavour because I thought it was a bit much when steeped hot. Then, when I strained it, I topped it off with some cashew milk!

It’s really good – light to medium bodied notes of coffee, malted barley, cocoa, cream, and nutty cashews (the last one from the milk, obviously) but not “sugary” at all so it’s like drinking a lighter and more natural mocha type drink? It’s perfect for me; I like the hint of roast in the coffee and the barley/cream/nutty notes, but I really don’t want something “slap me in the face” coffee in intensity because I’m not a coffee drinker. I can stand a dabble in tea format, but so many coffee/tea hybrids are like a level eleven out of ten; even DT’s two most successful coffee blends (Coffee Pu’erh and Vanilla Cappuccino) are both SUPER intense, just in difference ways. Coffee Pu’erh is like black coffee and amaretto, and Vanilla Cappuccino is a total sugar bomb.

This is… other.

Would I enjoy it all the time/consistently? Probably not; coffee just really isn’t my thing so I wouldn’t expect that level of consistency from my own tastes.

Today, this is perfect though!

Tried this for the first time last (…?) week.

It’s not my thing, but to be fair I didn’t expect it to be anyway. Coffee teas and I don’t get along very well – and this definitely has a distinct roasted black coffee note, but mixed with like a mugicha drink!? Definitely some type of barley note going on, and that’s actually the best part IMO. I like the general maltiness, as well. I also really respect that this is coffee but it’s black coffee (hence the name) and doesn’t fall into the trap of being a sugary coffee drink or coffee and cream like so many other tea/coffee mixes out there.

Recently had this one again – can’t remember exactly what I thought of it last time but looking at my rating I’m guessing I liked it! I did this time around too – very full bodied, thick and intense tasting, but not perfume-y like floral teas described as “intense” often are. Perhaps it was because it was accompanied by such a robust black tea, or the mineral and even borderline metallic (ironic given the name) flavours but for a violet profile I actually found this time be quite a “masculine” cup of tea!

Loved the violet notes, though!

August Uncommon recently released a bunch of new tea blends, and it motivated me to place an order to restock my beloved Dots & Loops as well as try the new flavours – which included this tea. I actually ended up just grabbing samples of every single tea on their website that I hadn’t tried before, so now I’m flush with new AU blends…

This was an intriguing tea for me – I tried a lot of violet blends in 2019, and for the most part I really liked them. It’s a flavour that I definitely feel really familiar with now; but this concept – a smoked violet – is very different from everything else I’ve had. Not to mention that AU does “concept teas” (versus “flavour recreation” blends) really well, so I was excited to see if the smoked violet profile seemed fitting for a name like ‘Black Metallic’.

Surprisingly, especially because AU has a serious penchant for using Lapsang Souchong in their black tea blends, this actually isn’t really that smoky!? It’s a little bit there, but I’d describe the flavour as much, much more of a sweet floral vibe with really distinct and juicy notes of violet. It’s sort of coating in the mouth as well, which is pleasant.

However, I feel like the name just seems strange given the overall sweet, floral nature of this tea!? But that said, I liked it a lot!

This is really just as described. A slightly grassy (albeit very mild) green base, with vanilla and cardamom. Both the vanilla and cardamom are strong and distinct, and work very well with the green tea. I really do like this one, but find it a bit boring, and probably won’t be purchasing it again once my sample is gone.

Trying a new approach with AU teas… lower temp. At the start of the cup I thought it was an improvement, but as I continue it seems less interesting. As it cools to a drinkable temp, there is an alkaline taste in there. I get something fruity in there, but can’t name which fruits. Sad to say I’m not into this one.

I can’t get the hang of this tea. If I steep it for 2 minutes it is weak and if I steep it for 3 it seems a bit bitter. It reminds me a lot of MF’s Wedding Imperial, which was also a tricky tea to get a good cup out of and required a lot of trial and error. Maybe I should look up my notes on that tea for the next cup of this. I’m struggling to get a good cup out of several August Uncommon teas. I have followed the steeping instructions, but come out with a cup less than what I was hoping for and not what the scent of the tea teased of. I feel like the times and temps are too high, but haven’t sorted out what they should be for each tea. I don’t want tea to be so much work! LOL!

I smell deep rich caramel in this. The sip starts out neutral, then the caramel creeps in, then the bitterness mid way and through the last of the sip. It fades on the finish and the caramel notes come back on the finish. Adding cream dulls the flavors, but also mutes the bitter. I have a lot more to work out with this tea.

I’m not big on herbals but the melon aspect surely made me curious. This tea is very different from anything I normally drink but it’s not too bad. The melon is very front and center. It would be very easy for mint to overwhelm the melon but it’s honestly perfectly balanced to not overwhelm. Theres a nice cooling sensation that follows the melon. I thought it was pretty tasty as a hot tea and I could see myself drinking it here and there but my next task will be to try it cold. I think it’s going to be a spectacular iced tea!