Della Terra Teas

Loose, this tea looks like a rooibos with a little bit of black tea in it. There is a surprising amount of dried blueberries, which is nice. There are also flower petals, as usual (Della Terra really loves them I guess). The dry tea smells like blueberry yogurt to me, in the best way. Maybe with a hint of vanilla. I actually made this one twice.

The first time, I steeped it for 5 minutes. I thought the rooibos got a bit too strong in this one, but the blueberry flavor was very deep and yummy – sort of a jammy blueberry flavor.

The second time, I steeped it for 3 minutes. This time there is a much better balance of rooibos versus flavors. It tastes like lovely sweet blueberries with a little bit of sweet cream and vanilla poured over the top. The rooibos flavor is there, but it’s more of a background note. I added about a teaspoon of sugar and it really helps the blueberry flavor shine. I’m sure this would be tasty with milk also. Rooibos haters won’t love this one but I think they would find it tasty enough. I would like a little bit stronger of a flavor, but I still find it quite good. :)

I don’t know much about oolongs, but this one is definitely oxidized – the leaves are extremely dark brown, almost black. They’re large leaves that are rolled into loose pellets and a few of them are unrolled. There are yellow flower petals (I assume for aesthetics) and little baby cubes of some form of caramel solid. This tea smells fantastic! It reminds me of butter rum lifesavers mixed with Werther’s hard candies. Yum yum yum! I want this as a perfume – I would have to beat them away with a stick! The leaves are fairly bulky so I used a very heaping teaspoon for my 8 ounces of water.

The brewed tea smells so buttery, it just melts you from the inside. The sweet, caramely scent is there too, playing second fiddle. This tea tastes fantastic too! The butter hits first, then the sweet caramel and cream flavors. I don’t know anything about oolong, but I feel like this one must be toasted because there’s this amazing rich, roasty toasty nut flavor in the background. It totally makes this tea! It’s like a sweet, flaky, buttery roasted almond tart with caramel and honey drizzled all over the top. Everyone must try this now! Go go! Oh, and I added a little bit of sugar to this one.

The dry leaf of this tea has a lot of interest. The green leaves are long and slightly fluffy, and they appear to have been rolled into little cigarette shapes. I don’t see much white tea in here – there appear to be a few scattered silver needles and some of the smaller leaf pieces could be bai mudan, but I’m not sure. There are pink rose petals and little squares of what looks like almond. There’s a decent amount of dehydrated raspberry that is broken into small pieces, which is a good idea in my opinion. The mini white chocolate chips are few and far between, much to my dismay. It smells strongly of tart raspberry (the exact scent reminds me of some raspberry candy… Jolly Rancher maybe?) with some musty green and hay in the background. I used a heaping teaspoon and brewed for 3 minutes at 175.

The brew smells vegetal with the same tart raspberry scent and little bit of hay. The taste is similar to the smell. I like this raspberry flavor even though it’s not entirely a genuine flavor. It’s tart and pleasing and it doesn’t entirely overpower the vegetal taste of the tea. However, I get zero white chocolate taste out of this, even though I made sure that there were a couple chips included in my teaspoon of tea. This makes me very sad because I was really looking forward to the raspberry and white chocolate combination… This is a fairly tasty raspberry green tea, but even with sugar I don’t taste any chocolate. Shame.

Number two from my Della Terra order! If nothing else, this tea is adorable – I love the sprinkles. Mine has these weird little pastel-colored squishy spheres in it. They’re about peppercorn size and they feel spongy when I squeeze one. I’m not sure what they are, Della Terra’s website says that the add-ins can change due to availability. I didn’t go as far as to eat one… There are also little baby sugar crystals dyed in pastel colors. Cute! The dry tea smells very strongly of rooibos with some kind of weird sour note and maybe a tiny bit of sugar. Very strange. I brewed two teaspoons for 5 minutes because in my last experience, the tea wasn’t strong enough with the recommended amount.

The brewed tea smells like rooibos and… cherry lozenges? This was not a flavor I expected to find. There’s also a quiet note of spun sugar in the background somewhere. When I first tasted the tea, it kind of just tasted like rooibos. So then I added a teaspoon of sugar and I think that really helped the flavoring, because it got extremely sweet (sweeter than I would expect from the amount of sugar). I definitely taste the rooibos, but thank goodness there is no cherry lozenge here. I do get spun sugar from this, but there’s also some kind of vanilla-esque flavor. Then there’s something that reminds me of a mildly fruit flavored hard candy. This is extremely sweet, and anyone who doesn’t enjoy rooibos is certainly not going to like it. I happen to like rooibos, so I am finding it very tasty. I’ll definitely play with steep times just to see how it affects the level of rooibos versus flavor.

I sent out my first swaps ever today, hooray! Thanks to Arshness and Ost for their friendliness. :D Ladies, I sent your tracking numbers via private messages.

This is my first tea to try from my Della Terra order that arrived today. It was full of shameless dessert teas like this one and cotton candy… Sue me! The dry leaf of this tea smells amazing – mostly butter with brown sugar undertones. It’s black tea mixed with a decent amount of candied pineapple pieces, various flower petals, and the occasional dried cherry. I have to assume the cherries are only there for style, since there were only like five total in my 1 ounce package. This makes sense, considering the maraschino cherries on top of the pineapple upside down cake are only there for show, too.

The first time, I brewed the recommended teaspoon (mine was a bit heaping) for 3 minutes. It came out far too weak for my tastes. So then I did about a teaspoon and a half for 4 minutes and it definitely improved. The brewed tea smells strongly of butter and brown sugar with kind of a toasted nut smell. It reminds me of a really buttery pound cake with some kind of glaze, which is pretty much what pineapple upside down cake is. I don’t get any pineapple in the smell.

The tea itself is quite tasty. I can taste the base just barely, so it must be a fairly mild variety since I steeped for 4 minutes and with extra tea. The flavor is very buttery and sugary with hints of dark caramelized sugar and cream. I think it equates very well to the actual cake used in the dessert, but I am getting zero pineapple here. Not even a hint of pineapple. And to be honest, that’s okay with me because this does cake very well. This is almost a dead ringer for that terrible-for-you sliced butter cake that you can buy at grocery stores (it’s like a more ridiculous pound cake basically).

I feel like this tea is a little weak, maybe I’ll try 2 full teaspoons next time I make it. Very tasty though!

The smell of this tea is absolutely amazing… spiced like the scent of a cozy, little cottage. tehehe..silly description, but that’s what it is! :] The flavor is a bit more spice than it is honey, but it is delicious nonetheless. It’s a little bit on the lighter side as far as flavor goes, but the aftertaste is stronger. Generally the aftertaste of teas can fall a little flat for me, but this one has the spice and the honey intermingling in a lovely manner. This tea has transitioned me from a hectic day of people to comfy and cozy cuddling up to a nice book. :]

I have never been a huge cinnamon fan. But, like everyone else, I do enjoy cinnamon buns from time to time. This is the perfect cinnamon tea for me-not too overpowering, it’s just right. (: Tastes exactly like a cinnamon bun, even with a hint of icing flavor.
After years and years of not being able to eat desserts in peace, I’m soo excited to have found teas that taste exactly like the desserts I have been missing out on through the years! _

Having this one this afternoon as my Victory tea! Got up at 5 and took my drugs, pushed myself to go to work and to stay till 2:30 which is the usual time when I go home. Was a lot more pain today than yesterday but it was still a good day and I got to spend time with my awesome co-workers! So that made me really happy! :D
Haven’t had this tea in a while. But man do I still love it!!

After a super busy day at work, I thought I’d come home, drink tons of straight black teas and do nothing. xD
But..
Then I realized that I have a crap load of things to do. xD Sooo took a pain killer and while waiting for it to kick in I brewed up this tea!
Tis a good comfort tea. ^^

Mmmm still a wonderful tea. It was a really nice, comforting tea to come home to after a hard day at work. Had a relaxing afternoon with this one today. (:

Mmmm (: I have to get more of this soon….1oz is not enough!

Only bought an ounce of this to see what all the hype was about…that was a mistake! Now this tea is once again unavailable, for who knows how long! But it will definitely be worth the wait once I can get more!
I thought this tea would taste way more fruity than it actually did. But it’s creamy, almost caramel-y. It’s just…ugh…this tea. It’s so good.
It just tastes so creamy and sweet. There’s a light pineapple taste to it, but not overpowering. This tea is definitely a win! :D

Had this the other day. Wasn’t entirely sure that I’d still like it since my taste buds have changed so much.
But it’s just as good as I remembered! It’s super sweet like DavidsTea’s Birthday Cake, but it also has a creamy battery note in it that just completes it.
The DavidsTea one has kinda been tasting off lately, like just pure sugar which I usually like…but I don’t know…just is a bit too much for me :S
Oh well.
Glad I have this one! :D

Della Terra is redeeming itself after the Cotton Candy tea!
I absolutely love this tea! Something about Birthday teas that appeals to me. xD It’s so sweet-quite similar to David’s Tea’s Birthday Cake.
So syrup-y and sweet. Ugh. This tea. I love it. So much. Definitely gotta stock up on this one! If you haven’t tried it, then buy it! So worth it! Doesn’t even need sweetener!

You know…I thought this was gonna be so much better than it actually was. Thought it was gonna be wayyy sweeter, like their Red Velvet Delight blend. But it doesn’t have tons of flavor. Weird.
The same with the smell. It wasn’t strong enough for me. Definitely not gonna buy more, but I’m glad I tried it!
Maybe one day They’ll make a sweeter batch of this…that would be awesome!
But I’m not one to add sweetener to my tea, so perhaps if I did that it would be better.
Wasn’t a terrible tea, but nothing to really write home about. xD

I love white chocolate, and although I would much rather stuff my face with some real chocolate, the flavour is good. It is a quite simple tea, with the main flavours being white chocolate, with a hint of caramel and something that reminds me of hay, but is not quite that. Wheat maybe? It reminds me of David’s Tea’s Birthday Cake without the yucky.

So much for my love of flavored teas :-/
I taste the marshmallows, but the base tea is much to watery & weak
and it just doesn’t stand up to the marshmallows and sweetness well.
For me, the base tea needs to be much heavier.
Mostly with this one I just get overly sweet with little substance.
The really sad part is the dry tea looked and smelled so yummy…
sigh…perhaps my expectations were too high.

I really really enjoy this. The coconut flavour is just bold enough and the vanilla that comes through just makes it that much better. It’s not on the MUST buy list, but definitely on the Will probably end up buying one :P

This one just didn’t do it for me. It’s like it couldn’t commit. Not quite chocolate, not quite pumpkin, not quite pumpkin pie spice. It’s all ALMOST there, but just not enough of any of them. Thin, weak cup. Not for me….

Tea number three of the mystery box. I don’t know why this tea wasn’t in the steepster database, it’s delicious! :]

It’s a gorgeously cloudy day here in Seattle..and the Holland vs. Spain world cup game is on…and I have a dog cuddling up on my lap. So it’s an absolutely perfect day to drink my weight in tea :D

It’s probably the cloves, but this tastes like a chai to me. It’s delicious and the flavors really do dance over my tongue like in Tchaikovsky’s ballets. Mmm. Can’t wait to try this one as a latte. Della Terra, you have done it, again!

Loved that penguin belly slide after the goal! HUP HOLLAND! 1-1

Tea number two from my mystery box… yeah, I can tell these mystery boxes are going to be a new addiction for me…tehehe:P

This tea smells divine… and the leaves look absolutely gorgeous… but.. I don’t know what it is, I don’t like it. Maybe it’s the fact that I don’t like chocolate and the mint really isn’t that strong. Sitting here drinking it thinking about how I should like it.. but it’s just not doing it for me, too bad.

Leaving it unrated for a bit until my boyfriend can give me an unchocolate-biased review. :] I bet he will like it:]

This tea… oh my goodness..this is pure creaminess and sweetness in a cup. With just a hint of spices…mmm…mm.. I don’t know how they did it, obviously with the special Della Terra magic that they have in their store room, but this tea actually seemed a bit thicker to me… completely pulling together the whole eggnog name. AND…it resteeps well.. got two additional steeps:] Yeah, I’m a happy camper right now. When Christmas time rolls around, I’m going to need this tea in large quantities.

I love this tea that I found in the Tea and Cards TTB because it has vanilla, a bit of mint and big tones of confectioner’s sugar. I do not love this tea because there is a sort of plastic-y taste to it as well. I would drink it again, but that strange taste is annoying. Is it just me?

Love this tea tons bc it smells just like a sweet, just baked cake dry!
I hate how with rooibos, it always tastes fab dry, but once you actually steep it, a lot of the flavour goes away :(
Maybe I’ve just been brewing it wrong, I don’t know! But the woodsy rooibos definitely kicks in and takes over the sweet cakey smell that I got before steeping.

Thank you tons to QueenOfTarts for sending it my way! Enjoying my last cuppa :)