Herbal Infusions

I ordered a sample of this one in my Herbal Infusions order. I’m not huge on chais, but I’ve been working on coconut chais slowly. They are actually coming along quite well.

The water fizzed when I poured it in my mug to steep. Hehe. It definitely smells chai-like. With creaminess. I’m getting a bit obsessive over creaminess in my teas.

Holy crow. I may have oversteeped this because, hello astringency (1.5 tsp for 3 minutes), or perhaps boiling water wasn’t the answer. It’s still piping hot, so maybe I’ll take another sip in a few minutes when it’s had more of a chance to cool.

While I was out I got 4 swaps/shares in the post. Hopefully you all enjoy your teas Aimee Popovacki, Angrboda, Roswell Strange, and VariaTEA!

Update: I dumped out that cup. No time for astringency! This time around I tried 1.25 tsp for 2.5 minutes at less than boiling.

This attempt is definitely less astringent. The coconut isn’t really present, perhaps only in a creaminess dimming the spicy chai-ness.

I have read from other people’s notes to not expect a true vanilla cacao, but more of a spiced variety, so I was prepared for something different, but this…? Very strange, there was some sort of meat flavor in there that finally made me dump the mug, it was just not enjoyable. Really weird tea.

This one came in my Herbal Infusions order today.

The scent is pretty awesome. Warm creamiscle. I have to say the taste is more orange than cream. I wish there was more of a cream aspect to it because I adore creamy teas. My package of this specially says “Orange Lapacho/Vanilla”, but I’m not so sure I’m getting vanilla. I’ll update as I sip away.

On the upside, this lapacho type of tea is great! When I saw a comparison to rooibos/honeybush I was slightly concerned since I generally don’t play nicely with those, but there’s no bizarre medicinal taste here. Yay, lapacho!

P.S. Maybe orange is the flavour that works with these teas that I can get on board with? I loved L’Automne with orange and rooibos, and I’m enjoying this one with orange and lapacho. Hmm.

Backlog:

An interesting cup of tea. Not my favorite from Herbal Infusions, but, not bad either. The name … sort of suggested to me that it might be something like a s’mores, but there’s no chocolate to it which … I guess I’m wishing there was. Imagine that, huh? Me? Wanting chocolate? Ha!

I taste black tea, and it’s a mild, even tempered sort of tea. As the tea cools, I notice more and more of the graham notes. The coconut is off in the distance.

It’s tasty … it’s a bit more cookie-ish than it is s’mores-ish but the description didn’t mislead me … I allowed myself to be misled because of the graham in the name. That’s my fault, not the fault of the tea. It’s pretty tasty.

Sipdown!! (128)

Thank you Cavocorax for sharing this tea. It is certainly very interesting. It smells sweet so I was not expecting the little kick of spiciness I got in my first sip. However, when I took a second to think about it, “fireside” should probably have given that away. I don’t mind spice but I don’t particularly enjoy drinking it tbh so this tea is just not for me. It was fun to try though.

To be completely honest, I thought this was going to be like the Denali ice cream flavor Moosetracks (vanilla ice cream with fudge ripple and peanut butter cups) and I was really intrigued how that was going to translate to tea.

This is not that.

This is still very good.

I can’t believe this hasn’t been pointed out yet, because I think this tastes so much like chocolate covered espresso beans it’s magic.

I don’t really get anything from the coconut and the slight bit of nuttiness isn’t quite hazelnut to me as it compounds the delicious effect of espresso beans.

For some reason I just got the image of Pac Man eating espresso beans, so I thought I would share with all of you.

And then this happened: http://imgur.com/hOPXaKF

Thanks NayLynn! That was…an experience.

As I was hoping, this does indeed get better when you way overleaf it (I tripled my standard amount!), provided you like the bittersweetness of dark chocolate. It still feels a little thin bodied though the flavor is for sure amped up. Next time I’ll try making it super strong and then cutting it with cream. Right now, and as it cools upon resteep, it’s like taking an 80%+ cacao bar of chocolate, melting it down, adding milk or cream but not sweetener (it’s silky, rich, and intense but not terribly sweet), and drinking it in liquid form.

Even getting the prep just right I can tell this isn’t going to replace American Tea Room’s Choco-Late for me. That one’s very “cheap packet hot chocolate for little kids, complete with the intense granular salt-sugariness” nostalgic junky comfort food while this one, worked out to its best prep, is going to be more grown up, richer and more solid, well, cacao beany. There’s a place for both sorts of course, but the dirty truth is I probably will appreciate the former more when I reach for it because it’s, I dunno, an instant trip down memory lane without having to keep actual crappy packets of Swiss Miss around indefinitely going stale for just those moments. This kind of thing just makes me want to go back to Asheville and drink a mug of modern day Xocolatl from French Broad or something, or whip up some liquid Dagoba Xocolatl. Plus, that stuff’s intense no matter how you shake it; a little gourmet thimble’s worth and your taste buds and belly both feel stuffed to the brim.

I’m not conveying myself clearly; ugh it’s late. I guess what I mean is, when prepped right this does a bang up job at being that rich, thick, intense cacao bean drink one imagines in tiny cups. But part of me is more grateful that the cheap Swiss Missy substitute version of cacao husk tea exists. That both do is pretty great though, of course.

Woah! I like this! I actually prefer the straight Tisano cacao over the herbal infusions one, maybe cause I overleaf that one like mad since I can get it free overnight on amazon (Herbal infusions seems to take awhile). BUT… I definitely prefer this mint cacao over the Tisano one. That one is wayyyyyyyyy too minty. This one is perfect! Just enough mint to give a nice flavor but not enough to drown out the chocolate. A nice after dinner treat. I dumped my whole sample into the mug as I like to seriously overleaf the cacao teas. Glad I did. Very full and rich.

It’s interesting to try this, being a largely non-alcoholic person. This tea is rather floral and perfumed. All told, it’s not bad, though I think a wine aficionado (or someone who at least enjoyed an occasional cup) would be able to say a bit more about the taste than I could.

VariaTEA gave me a sample of this and I dumped the entire thing into my mason jar! OH YEAH. This is a mason jar tea. I let it steep for 10 minutes and added milk and it is pretty delicious.

Still a little thin, but, it’s not an actual hot chocolate so I’ll do the best with what i have. And this is enjoyable. Not sure I’d want 100g of it, but maybe 50. Thanks for letting me steal your sample!!!

(And I had better get off to bed. I’ll regret staying up in 6.5 hours. DOH)

I received a sample of this from MissB with the teas I ordered in her tea stash sale. Thank you!

I made the first cup of this and thought man this is weak. How could you ever event think to substitute this for hot chocolate. Then I read through some of the reviews and realized I had really under steeped this. The second cup I had I let it hang out for quite a while. Yummy.! This was a spiced hot chocolate. If I ever get the chance to put in an order from Herbal Infusions I would order some of this. Thank you for sharing MissB!

I figured this would be another great mason jar tea so I steeped a huge batch of it up, and then to coax additional flavour from it, I let it sit for 10 minutes.

That might have been a mistake. I can really taste bark, and then a bit of orange, and then just a little cream. Huh. So I added a bit of milk and that toned the bark down and upped the cream, but this still isn’t as good as it smells. GUYS – this smells amazing. But the smell is just a trick.

Sip down. It was good but I still like Bayswater’s Chocolate Macchiato and Crème Brulee blends a lot better. This one’s a little thin in comparison. No nuts. It does, however, kind of taste like an iced coffee when you drink it with some cream and let it cool down a bit.

Poor Steepsterites, getting over a week’s worth of sipdowns in one shot. I promise I’m done!

Moose Tracks smells gloriously gourmand. Like the ice cream! At least from memory. Very pungent coffee smell, which is so invigorating and tantalizing that I couldn’t resist brewing this when it’s so close to 9pm already. Where did the day go?

First sip sans additives and its coffee, coffee, coffee, with a tiny bit of cream. Like the coffee flavour you get from espresso ice creams.

With half and half, it really hits the spot. Not sure if I get the nuts? Maybe a little, but it’s vague. I went ahead and added some Kahlua because I kind of need to use it up. It’s pretty yummy.

I still think I prefer Bayswater’s Chocolate Macchiato, though. And their hazelnut blends. Hmm. Now there’s a mixing idea.

Raritea had this today and mentioned it being a little astringent, so i back off the steeping time just to see if i could hit the sweet spot.

This reminds me a little of stacy’s almond tea, but without the over all great tea base. Not that i liked that one of hers, but i could appreciate the tea base. :) This one has an ok flavour to it, but it’ll never be my favourite. I’m glad half the bag is going to Kittenna AND it was free. I think there are a number of you out there who would like this one a bunch, but i’m fairly picky about my almond teas, i’ve found and don’t like ones that remind me of almond extract…which this one does slightly. Still though, Thanks go out to Herbal Infusions for adding a bit of extra fun to the Toronto Tea Festival!! I’ll be sharing my half with a few ppl just to help spread the love :)

Put this in a big mug tonight. I’m trying to watch the Olympic opening ceremonies but I’m suddenly kind of tired. We can’t have that!

Reading MissB’s reviews made me a little nervous, because I don’t like not knowing what’s in my food/drinks. It’s more of a habit than an actual worry about this particular tea, because I doubt there are peanuts or significant amounts of wheat in here. It smells really good, though, so I guess it can be excused. It’s like marzipan but slightly fruitier.

Sadly I think I messed this one up, because I thought it was entirely a black tea. Turns out there’s green in here too. It’s bitter but at least it’s not completely undrinkable. The aftertaste is pure marzipan. Sadly this is a sipdown, so I won’t be able to experiment further with it, but even with me messing it up it’s not bad.

1.5 tbsp for 375 ml

Black tea astringency is overpowering the flavouring. I will have to try to infuse at a lower temperature.

I am a huge fan of the cacao teas, but I didn’t love this one. I got spice, but not vanilla per se. It was truly a strange sipping experience to say the least. I gave it my usual cacao treatment, bit of sugar, long steep and I should get the hot chocolate I am looking for. I had worried from the scent of the husks that this was not going to be a hit, and I was right in this case. There is a smoothness I might call vanilla, maybe. But it is not the milky, vanilla chocolate taste I wanted. I did not enjoy the flavours in this at all. I can tell that this is well blended and the tea performs beautifully, but it is just not a flavour I personally like. Full marks to herbal infusions for their inventive cacao teas (I love, love, love every other variety), but I think this is one tea that will need to find a different cupboard. One where it can be properly appreciated for the unique blend it is.

Thank you so much to Dexter3657 for sending me a generous sample of this!

This is good, but it reminds me almost spot on to Argo Tea’s Earl Grey Creme which is not limited edition and easier to get a hold of, though the snowflakes are pretty darn cute.

I used about 1.5 teaspoons of leaves in a 12oz mug and added sweetener

Backlog:

The oolong tea has an earthy flavor, with notes of toasty nut which adds a compelling contrast to the sweet-tart flavors of the citrus fruit. The citrus notes were bright and lovely.

The second infusion is better than the first, so this is one you definitely want to resteep!

here’s my full-length review: http://sororiteasisters.com/2013/12/10/juicy-lemon-pink-grapefruit-oolong-tea-from-herbal-infusions/

Last tasting note and second teapot experiment yesterday. I brewed a friend and I a pot of this, sweetened it, and just let it sit and steep as we played board games for the evening. As I had hoped, it just got better and better. The strawberry notes were initially the dominant flavour but, as it steeped, the chocolate really started to shine through. I can never decide if I like this or the original better, but I enjoy them both!

This was amazing! Like seriously wonderful!! I brewed some up with just a pinch of sugar when I got home today and truly enjoyed the cup.

I am loving these cacao husks as a replacement for hot chocolate. I do think they need a much longer steep time than any other type of tea, but, brewed long enough they are worth it!

Afternoon tea with R today.

Dry this smells exactly like that bottled Nellie and Joe’s Key Lime juice one can get at the store, plus it’s making me have a visceral memory of something from childhood but I cannot for the life of me place it. A candy or powdered drink, maybe. Strong and specific.

Steeped, the smell is still there but mutates slightly, and unfortunately brings with it that pool chlorine/cleaner aspect that is hard to avoid (there was some early 52teas intro last year for me that did the same, forget what exactly). But if you kind of avoid thinking about the chlorine/cleaner thing, it does definitely evoke chemical-y key lime pie. I don’t know what to say here exactly—it’s kind of both offputting and good, tilting back and forth each sip. I even get the oily graham cracker crust in the back. Smoothed out some with the clearance Harney goat caramels that came in the mail today, so apparently adding something genuinely creamy-tangy-sweet-rich helps (makes sense).