Nina's Paris

Thanks to Laurent and Mélanie from Nina’s I can taste this lovely named tea.
Irony is there : I wanted to buy the homonymous tea from Theodor and it was out of stock so here I am to taste another je t’aime proving if necessary that we can have several loves and say je t’aime to several teas (even in the same day, even in the same hour !)

Well I am not finding it strong (but it’s not weak, neither light bodied)and I am not sure if the stronger taste with this this cup is coming from the base… Laurent would you reveal us a Nina’s secret and tell us what kind of tea base is used here – It’s written Keemun on my sachet as the other teas I had from Nina’s but I am wondering …

I steeped it 4 min and it was nice, not bitterness nor astringency, until now I never had a Nina’s bitter even if I never respected the brewing instructions as with 2 minutes I found them too light for my taste.
The flavours are just perfect, delicate as always with this lovely brand but this time I think the tea base is working really better for me with these flavours.

Another caramel chocolate tea I like.

I went to the shop rue Danielle Casanova 1 week ago and it was still closed for work, I would love to take a friend of mine to have a brunch here, let’s wait so…

Gahhh too much smoke. The smell is so smoky that it makes it hard to taste anything else. It’s not ashy or astringent. There is a touch of sweetness if you can get past the super smoky scent. But bah, it turns out that I really don’t like smoky tea.

No rating because I think that this would be enjoyable for people who do like smoke. Thanks to Laurent at Nina’s Tea for the sample.

Thanks to Laurent for the rooibos samples! I’ve actually only had rooibos once before and did not care for it too much. Anyway, I didn’t look up what flavor this was supposed to be because I’m trying to train my nose/I like surprises. Upon smelling the dry leaves, I definitely detected the sweet tones of caramel. Likewise with the tea, there was a strong caramel scent. The caramel was not as strong in the taste of the tea, but still made for a decently sweet cuppa.

I’m not giving this an official number rating yet because I’m still trying to figure out my feelings about rooibos in general and don’t want this tea to get caught in the crossfire just yet. Good thing I have more samples to explore!

Thank you Nina’s for this tea sample

I could tell when I opened the little serving packet that the aroma of the tea was quite strong. It wasn’t my first encounter with Nina’s, so I was aware that there would be a lavish amount of flavor, and that if I over-steeped the tea it could be disastrous.

A light touch, lighter than recommended, would be best.

I used a small teapot, fresh boiled spring water and a 2 minute steep which produced a very rich, smooth and creamy caramel-vanilla tea.

With no additions, the tea was sweet and smooth. With cream I would be satisfied but I couldn’t resist adding sweetening, drinking my tea the way most people would drink a flavored tea.

My easily suggestive mind began imagining salted caramels…so I went to the kitchen and looked for the sea salt because I didn’t have any pretzels or chips. I tasted the salt and sipped the tea…thinking that I’d want this salty combination or some chocolate while kicking back watching a movie. Sweet caramel and salty or dark chocolate are favorites of mine.

I don’t believe a 4 minute steep is a good idea. Tone it down to 2 minutes! (I even made 12 oz of tea instead of 8 oz with that little packet Nina’s sent me.)

This is a pretty good one, thanks for the sample Laurent. I kind of forgot it so it must have steeped like 10+ minutes but still turned out good. It totally does taste like peaches, apricot and cream but the taste changes as it cools. I tasted more cream when it was hotter and then at the end the apricot was strongest. I wonder how why they chose this flavoring for Scorpio? I would’ve thought something bolder but its nice. I like samples, I like apricot but not a lot so I don’t think I’d buy it to drink often.

Its raining, and so its time for the cozy cup of vanilla caramel warmth that is Je t’aime. Ah, just right for a day like today.
But it is, unfortunatly, a sipdown. Boo! I am now out of vanilla caramel teas.
The question is, which to restock? Well, really the question is, which to restock first……

Only the favorites today. Vanilla and caramel, one of my favorite combinations. And this is such an elegant version of it.

The late morning pot of tea. What to choose? A meh tea that I should sip down? A new flavor? No, an old favorite today. A warm sweater cup of tea, to sooth and relax.
I do love this, caramelly and vanillay and so very nice.

Oh, last night was a beautiful night of sleep. Hurrah! And I woke up to a cold and misty morning, which are my favorite kind. So I have brewed this, my wooly sweater caramel and vanilla tea. It was made for this kind of day. Yum.

Its still raining, rare enough event around here, and so its to the smokey, caramelly vanilla-y warm sweater tea.
When I bought this, I was suspicious, and only bought a small amount. Now I feel like I am greedily parcing it out. I will need more of this, before the winter is through.
There is nothing, in my mind, quite like having a quiet morning to sit in your robe, and watch the rain, drinking lovely tea.

Good lord its windy. I feel as if I may be whisked off to Oz at any given moment, which would be a good adventure, but is very hard on ones hairdo.
I have a little midmorning break, and so I have cut myself a slice of cinnamon coffee cake, and have brewed up this.
I’ve said before that this is a wooly sweater tea, and it really is. A sophisticated blend of caramel and vanilla, and just perfection on this blustery day. I’ve been saving it for just such weather. Next rainstorm will be good for this too!
Its funny how we associate teas with weather, isnt it?

A small tin of this was a gift to myself for finishing my last Camp Nanowrimo fifty thousand word first draft. An excelent gift, as my writings are always powered by tea.
The balance of caramel and vanilla is quite good. The flavors are a malty vanilla and caramel, with maybe a touch of brown sugar? Yum. This isnt a light and playful vanilla, but a dark and serious vanilla, which is not very common, in terms of tea. Its like a wooly blanket on a frosty morning. I think this will be wonderful when the weather cools down, but its pretty nice now as well.

Tea of the morning…..

This one I ordered based on recommendations. I did not get in on the free sample frenzy offered by Laurent, but just jumped in with this one. I mean, it has a Keemun base. It should be a favorite. I did order through Amazon, and purchased 100g in a bag.

The bags can only be temporary storage in my opinion. They are a very heavy plastic, but one side is clear. My 100g came in two bags, and they were not even sealed other than the zip closure. Most companies heat seal them. All in all, it still works out for me because I have more tins lying around than I care to count. It was easy to pull the stickers off of one bag to put on the tin because they were small. To purchase in a tin, the price was going to jump $6 ($5 for the actual tin and a little more in the shipping.)

So far, I do like this one. It has a wonderful base, but I am still trying to wrap my brain around the bergamot. It is pretty mellow. I think I will need a few more tastes before I can place it.

All in all, a good experience. I have been wanting to try it, but so far am not wowed. Usual teapot method.

This is a really nice everyday tea with great cherry plum fruit notes and a nice body given to it by the bop nature of it’s leaves. I’m curious as to what estate or region this tea came from as I suspect I would like the one more as I suspect it would be slightly less tannic. However as it is it would pair nicely with milk if you like a sweet fruity tea with milk.

Dry the tea is very fine bop approaching larger fannings, that smell very fruity. My first steep was about 2 minutes at about 96 degrees Celsius. The result was a clear copper red brew that smelled very fruity with notes of plum, very ripe sweet cherry, cocoa and light malt.

The scent translated into a tea with a first note of cocoa and thicker tannic malt supported by strong fruit notes underneath it with more than enough body to support milk. The fruit notes were oddly strongest when hot. Perhaps the fruit would come out more with sugar or a slightly cooler brewing temperature. The tea was only slightly astringent and was pretty smooth for a bop ceylon.

Second steep was for 2.3 minute at around 92 degrees Celsius. The fruit, cocoa and tannic malt notes were still present, but were better balanced. This steep was more astringent.

This was quite a nice tea that I would happily drink again! Thanks again Sophie and Laurent for the sample.

Thank you Nina’s for this tea sample!

Sweet, yellow delicious apples grew outside my bedroom window facing East towards the Coast Range just shy of the Pacific Ocean.

My father, Bill, had chosen a dwarf variety…which produced so many apples, that the tree appeared to be a vine with stakes holding up the branches across the end of the house. The flesh was soft, sweet and perfumed with an almost honeysuckle scent.

No apples are so sweet, as Sun ripened!

Nina’s reminds me of those apples and the flowers I would have found in my Grandmothers garden. Roses, camilias, dogwood trees,lilys and room for her prized tomatoes. (I still have handwritten recipes for catsup and venison).

My mind wandered to Versailles. Dappled sunlight shining through the apple trees, a breeze rifting leaves like many courtesans fans.
Marie-Antoinette Tea would suit such oppulance of architecture and nature.

I didn’t find the tea too much like Apple cider. Usually apple teas are flat and bland for my taste.(Possibly some people steep longer and the tea sours?)

A delightfully elegant tea.

Wow, this tea is sweet and fruity. I like it. The cherry really stands out and I don’t think any other tea I’ve tried so far has this strong of a cherry taste. It totally reminds me of some candy that I can’t remember the name of. I’ve been mostly drinking stuff that I’ve already had trying to “get through” the stash but wanted to finally try new tea. It’s a holiday today so I have time to enjoy the tea, good time for tasting. Thanks to Laurent for asking me what I’d like to try when I made an order. Nina’s Tea has awesome customer service!

Another free sample from Laurent and Sophie at Nina’s Paris USA. This Ceylon tea smells slightly sweet and earthy and Ceylon-y. Ceylon has its own unique smell to me. The tea tasted bold but smooth. There was just a tinge of natural sweetness to the Ceylon. There is some malt to it, but it is not super malty. It did leave the slightest dry feeling in my mouth after swallowing but I would not describe it as astringent at all. Very good Ceylon. It makes me think it would make a great iced tea.

Thank you so much to Nina’s Paris for sending another envelope of samples! This one seems to have a different base than the Nina’s Paris teas I’ve tried before. It is intriguing but less strong than the other blends. This black tea base better showcases the flavors anyway. And I like the flavor! There is supposed to be a few fruits here, but what I taste is mainly peach and it’s a nice peach. (I’ve had some terrible flavored peach teas before and I think I’m remembering them in every tasting note for a peach tea. Not nice!) But this one is nice. I think I’ve equally liked all of the Nina’s teas I’ve tried so far!

So this tea is ok, but not as mind-blowingly awesome as other Nina’s Paris teas that I have enjoyed. I’m just not so keen on the grapefruit in this. I imagine it would be quite nice if it was iced though. It just screams summer to me! (220)

Another sample from Nina’s Paris! Thank you for letting me try your teas out. I’m looking forward to your online store. :D

This was a pleasant evening cup. The citrus really brightened up, and I am enjoying the lingering aftertaste too. It seems as though this tea is a little weak for my tastes, but I’m certain that if I’d steeped it for 3 minutes instead of 2, that would have been better.

I’m remember this for my pretty-much eventual Nina’s Paris order. ;)

I second Stephanie’s tasting note on this. If you like rooibos this would definitely be tasty. But seeing as I am not fond of rooibos at all, its just not my cup of tea. The smell was very fruity but I got nothing but rooibos from the taste. This is sadly, my last tea from my swap with Stephanie …Thank you for this swap and I hope to be swapping with you again :D. Enjoy your teas!

Thank you for the free sample!

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I heard they were giving away free rooibos samples, but this is amazing. It’s so fruity and creamy – I could tell immediately what flavour it was without reading the description.

I only used half of the sample to make this cup – I’ll have to ice the other half as I suspect it would be even better chilled!

Would I stock this? Yes

It’s been a while, Steepster. I had one of those colds that never goes away and drinking tea had been mostly useless. But I am back now. I think. Unless that evil evil cold comes back.

I think this may be my favorite of the Nina’s Tea samples I have tried. Chocolate orange is one of my favorite combinations and this one was very good. I have had one other chocolate orange blend before (Three Friends from Butiki) and I am still trying to figure out which one I liked more.

The orange flavor of this tea was very nice. It was not at all artificial and worked well with the chocolate. It smelled and tasted like orange zest…and that’s really the only part of the orange that I like. The chocolate really didn’t show up until the end of the sip. It was a nice cocoa flavor. I really didn’t get very much cream flavor at all but I really didn’t miss it. The base was also pretty tasty. It had a nice kick of astringency that cut the sweetness nicely.

I tried not to compare Hepburn to Three Friends and failed. I preferred the orange flavor of this one and the chocolate in Three Friends. I also think the marshmallow showed up more in Three Friends than the cream did here. I do think I preferred the base of Three Friends more. It was smoother and had a chocolaty taste on its own.

Thanks to Laurent for the sample.

I waited to make this sample until I had a friend for tea. She does a few reviews on here, and I thought it would be good to get more opinions on these samples.

This is really fruity smelling! I do taste the rooibos but I think I taste it even when other people don’t. I have only had red rooibos but I find it very distinctive. My friend absolutely loved the aroma of the dry mix!

We tried it hot and it was quite nice – smooth and fruity with a nice strawberry flavor that stood up to the rooibos flavor well. The grapefruit is lingering on the back of the sip and I think that is my favorite thing about this tea. That lasting fruitiness is great on a horribly hot and sticky day like today.

As I did last time, I saved the last eight ounces to chill and sweeten so I could try it iced. I think that rooibos lovers would be very pleased with this blend for an iced summer treat. In my clear glass, it looks like regular iced tea in both clarity and color and I think someone could fool me that it is a flavored black tea if I thought the rooibos was cherry flavor. I think this is my favorite of the Nina’s rooibos blends I have tried so far.

Thank you, Laurent and Sophie and Nina’s Tea! I quite enjoyed this sample!