ESP Emporium

Earthy. Woodsy. Ever so slightly fruity. Not for me.
Thanks for the sample though, The Cookie Lady! I tried! D:

I liked this so much more than I expected to! I bought it because of the abnormal ingredients…carrot, beet, eucalyptus….it all sounded so good until I opened the bag and ONLY smelled tangerine. That made me very sad, as I am generally not super fond of orangey-flavored teas. However, the eucalyptus and lemongrass really came through and made the tangerine just a minor background flavor. I definitely won’t have a problem drinking this for the rest of cold season :)

This tea is wonderful and full of flavor, it is rich and has a pleasant notes of honey. This is one of my favorite black teas. The leaves are spiraled and it has a nice amount of golden buds. The tea is decently priced !

I used the 2 grams of tea leaves to 6 oz of water recommendation. My pitcher on my tea maker reads in metric so I calculated the conversion to be 0.01127g (tea)/ mL. So for each scale mark on my pitcher I calculated the following:

500mL water = 5.64 g tea leaves
750mL water = 8.45 g tea leaves
1000ml water = 11.27 g tea leaves
1200ml water = 13.52 g tea leaves

I use a scale that can read to the nearest 100th of a gram or 10 milligrams.

Setting the temperature to 190F and time 1:30 min, I was able to get good flavor and 4 infusions out of my brew.

I think it was Azzrian who gave me this sample. Thanks!!

A basic fruity tea with some vanilla thrown in. Not particularly memorable but I finished the cup just fine and it was smoother than I expected. Maybe I’ll cold brew the last little bit.

Another tea picked up from Amazon for about $2 for about 2 oz. For the price, I’m impressed with it. It’s a gentle black tea and it was a tasty way to start the morning. You can taste the strawberries but not so much the coconut. It’s almost got a creamy factor to it as well. Overall, I’m pretty happy with it.

Back log

So this was an awesome find. Looking to fill my amazon cart to $25 so I could get free shipping on a few items and discovered this gem. 8 oz for less than $5. Um yes please!

So brewed this one up this am with my lovely Brevile. I was surprised how very smooth this was. The lemon and basil are lightly there but the oolong shines thru. Need to experiment with the brewing times before officially rating but I’m pretty happy so far with my find.

Teeny Tiny TTB Rd2

This wasn’t bad, per say, but when I think of Pina Colada tea, my love is Davidstea Tropicalia and this, while not bad, doesn’t even compare. I sweetened it, because without sweetener it was just ho-hum, but even sweetened, there is a bit of a sour taste in the back of my mouth and I can’t figure out what it is. It’s a little bit creamy, but not as creamy as Tropicalia. There’s a bit of pineapple and coconut taste, but not as much as Tropicalia – sorry I guess this review is a bit of a broken record. Not bad, by any means, but eh, I wouldn’t purchase.

Teeny Tiny TTB Round 2

Hmm… I must say, I really hesitate to try or order teas that contain coconut, just because it goes soapy very quickly, and then goes bad after that. But I figured I’d give this one the benefit of the doubt, plus there’s a large amount of it so I’m not taking the opportunity away from anyone else after me. There are tiny pieces of coconut and chunks of candied pineapple mixed in with the red rooibos base. Dry scent is mostly pineapple.

Oof, as soon as I lifted the brew basket out of my mug, I could smell soap. I can smell the lovely candied pineapple and a little bit of coconut, but there’s quite a strong soapy aroma. Oh well, I’ll give it a try anyway, for science! It tastes like… mint? What? I can taste creamy coconut as well, but no pineapple. What a strange blend.

This came to me from ThainofBuckland as part of the Christmas Card swap. Thank you!

This is a slightly smokey tea. I can also taste a bit of sweetness, but other than that I’m not picking up much flavor. It’s not astringent or bitter, which is good, but there’s not a whole lot going on flavor wise in my cup.

This is such an amazing tea! Well, amazing for chocolate lovers anyway… It doesn’t only smell like dark chocolate and milk chocolate, but like cherry hearts candy or like the cherry cordials by Queen Anne overflowing during the Christmas season, but it also has a similar taste, just not as strong. You can also taste the rose petals very subtly, but oddly not smell them before brewing (at least I couldn’t), and I’m not sure why I keep tasting Cherry when it’s made with Strawberries… Any ideas on that one?

If anyone enjoys these flavors and is interested in trading samples I have plenty of this left right now! It was my first time ever ordering loose leaf tea, found a great deal for a starter set with the ESP Emporium through Groupon, and I definitely didn’t know how much 4 oz. was!

Enjoying this tea for the second time (I forgot to log it yesterday) and I still really like it! My first inhale of the brewed tea (after 3 minutes of steeping) reminded me of Blueberry muffins! Such a sweet and pleasant aroma I couldn’t wait to drink it, and almost burned my tongue! The color wasn’t as green as I had thought green tea might look (I generally am not a green tea drinker, but the combination of these 3 flavors intrigued me), it was almost a very pale yellow color with the full 6 ounces of water. I haven’t had Gojiberry by itself so I wasn’t real sure of its flavor, but knew I really liked Pomegranate and Blueberry so it couldn’t be that odd of a combination. Even as I type this and my tea has cooled, I’m not getting any real bitterness like I thought I might have toward the end of the cup or if it got cold.

This makes a great iced tea. It has a lovely tropical taste with a short, sweet aftertaste. The dominant flavor is coconut while the lime comes in a close second.

It’s a very aromatic tea with a distinct orange spice aroma and hints of cream that take you back to wanting the frozen Popsicle treat by the same name – Creamsicle. The yogurt pieces really add a light but fragrant creaminess to the tea, and in my opinion is what really brings the Creamsicle memories to life. It’s not over the top creamy like if you were to add milk or creamer, just subtle hints in the taste, leaving it still a nice reddish orange color of tea.