T2

I am returning to Toronto tonight for Thanksgiving weekend so I explored what in my fridge was going to expire while I was away. One of those things was whipping cream so in an effort to not waste it I decided to make an earl grey hot chocolate. I also might have inverted the 2:1 ratio of milk to whipping cream, thereby using double the whipping cream compared to the milk. That is probably why I got one mouthful and just couldn’t bring myself to drink anymore. Turns out I wasted the whipping cream after all as well as milk, tea, and semi-sweet chocolate.

I have 4 more exams – 1 Monday, 1 Wednesday, and 1 Friday. The last is the following Monday. I was worried about the Wednesday exam the most because it is for the class that had the most difficult midterm last semester and I had not even started studying for it. I allotted today and tomorrow for that exam (technically I guess it was yesterday and today now since its 12:20) and when I woke up at 11, I was kicking myself for sleeping half the day away. However, I got through 5/10 lectures today and that was my goal so I treated myself to an earl grey hot chocolate. It was ever so tasty.

So I ran out of greek yogurt and decided I wanted a smoothie anyways. I got to thinking and thought of maybe throwing in some ice cream instead. I originally planned to use the salted caramel gelato that I have but when I opened my freezer I realized there was still the left over cup of London Fog I got from a small-batch ice cream spot here in London. So I pulled that out and then forgot so it melted.

When I ended up making the smoothie, or milkshake I guess, it was too thick so I brewed up this tea to compliment the london fog ice cream. Then it was too think so I added some bourbon vanilla bean gelato. Now it is the right consistency but very sweet. Banana and vanilla are the main flavors. There isn’t much bergamot which is surprising but oh well.

Had another EG hot chocolate last night. It was decadent, as usual.

Apparently I finished the Cream of Earl Grey by Four O’Clock so I am now working on this tea as an Earl Grey hot chocolate…since the milk expires tomorrow…I mean, what else was I supposed to do?!

So this is more floral than the other EG but this is still good. Also, these hot chocolates have spoiled me. My sister bought me drinking chocolates this weekend and I tried them and though they were rich, they just had nothing on the recipe. It was just lackluster despite chocolate and spices. This is just a whole other level of decadence and nothing else compares.

My friend brought this back from Australia for me and I used it to make an eggnog latte with a splash of vanilla for a London Fog of sorts. It’s not a very strong EG, which is fine for me but others might be disappointed by. For me, it’s just a nice citrus zip on a black tea eggnog latte. Quite relaxing.

Another sample from VariaTEA that my friend drank last night. This one is a pretty weak EG. He wasn’t overly impressed with it, in that it was, as others have mentioned, a weak EG. Still glad i had something to offer :)

This is exactly what its name says – Toasty Warm! I brewed according to the directions, which is pretty cool, so I’d be curious to try it warmer. It somehow does have nougat and nuttiness but isn’t at all sweet. I didn’t add anything to it, but I do think this would be even better with a bit of sugar. Sturdy enough for breakfast, but soft enough for afternoon or evening (if the caffeine isn’t an issue, of course). The only thing I don’t care for is that it seems to leave my mouth a bit sour, but that may be because I slept in today and haven’t brushed my teeth yet, lol!

It’s a solid breakfast tea without being bitter. I don’t get the pancake inspiration, but I swear this does remind me of raisin bread. I distinctly get raisins and cinnamon and bread or pastry. My husband and daughter think I’m nuts, though, about the raisins, so maybe it’s just me…but it was definitely there! I don’t love this as much as some of the other T2 teas I’ve tried, but I do think it’s good and I will enjoy all of it.

Autumn Harvest! Time to sipdown another of the T2 sampler stash (and one day, I’ll finally get through them all!)

Again I brewed the whole shebang to a single cup (5g sampler in a 350ml coffee cup, and their instructions claim to use 450ml!), and gave it a long steep (around 7-8 minutes), and even so, I can’t help but feel this one is tasting a bit weak. I had a different apple tea of theirs with the same brew ratios about a week ago (Apple Crumble) and it had a very rich and tangy fruity flavor, and I was hoping this would be the same, just lacking all the sweet caramel of the other blend. I love tart ‘n tangy so I’d be fine with a plain apple tea, but the flavor here isn’t as sharp and juicy as I was hoping for. It isn’t bad by any means, but if I was going to drink something like this, I would need about double what their little sampler provided to get the sort of flavor that I like, I think… and I already used less water than even they recommended! It tastes a little oddly artificially sweet to me, too. I don’t really mind a sweetness that I can attribute to something, but here it just seems… odd and uncomplimentary, because it isn’t really making the apples taste like Red Delicious, and it isn’t a caramel sweetness, it’s just… there.

If I could really leaf this up, I might like it, but as is, especially compared to T2’s Apple Crumble tea, it’s just underwhelming.

Autumn Harvest! Happy Thanksgiving, fellow Americans! This morning I decided to brew up another of my T2 sampler stash, a blend of bergamot, jasmine, and pear flavorings. I really enjoyed Bird & Blend’s (now discontinued) Jasmine Poached Pear, which paired jasmine and pear on a green base, so I have a feeling I’ll like that flavor combo on an earl grey tea too. Not quite the same, but perhaps a good enough substitute since B&B seems to rarely bring back their discontinued blends?

The steeped tea is a very dark cup, and smells mostly of the pear. The black tea itself is quite smooth with very mild astringency but the flavorings are so strong the base can’t be tasted much. The flavor tastes overwhelmingly of the bergamot, which comes off quite strongly, followed up by a floral jasmine sweetness. Since the bergamot is a little stronger than I tend to prefer, when it mixes with the floral, it comes off a little perfumey tasting on the tongue (though thankfully not at all in the aroma, so it isn’t bothering my migraine sensitive head at all). The bergamot and floral do mix well together, it just feels like their balance isn’t quite right, somehow. The jasmine can’t quite attone for a slight bitterness I’m getting from the bergamot, here. The pear hits later in the sip and fills out the mouth nicely afterwards, and I do like how these flavors go together… it’s just the strong open of bergamot at the beginning of the sip that seems to kind of throw the whole balance of everything off. I think if that had been toned down, the whole thing would’ve pieced together beautifully. As it is, it isn’t a tea I’d care to revisit.

Meh. B&B, can you please bring back Jasmine Poached Pears? Please? Maaaaaaaaah.

Autumn Harvest! Another from the great T2 sampler stash from the January 2018 after-Christmas clearance sale. This tisane mixes apple, chicory, and cinnamon with almonds and hazelnut brittle, and the brewed cup is a dark caramel color and smells incredibly sweet, reminding me of caramel apples.

I brew my chunky herbals on the stronger side (I dumped the full 5g sampler in the infuser to make a single 350ml cuppa) and am glad I did, because I am getting a really full, juicy green apple flavor in this cup. There is a sort of melted caramel sweetness to the cup, but it isn’t too sweet, which I actually like, allowing the fruit a nice tanginess. There is only the most subtle hint of some cinnamon sweetness toward the end of the sip, but the spice doesn’t really come through much here; this is mostly an apple tea with a good balance of tart and tangy fruit notes and sweet dessert notes. I like this one!

This is a strong, clean black tea base with a softness to it from the toffee flavors. It is definitely toffee, not caramel – subtle difference but one I appreciate. It’s warm and slightly nutty, with a sweet but not cloying finish.

I haven’t met a T2 tea I’ve disliked until now. It’s a lovely mix to look at, I’ll give it that. But I don’t know if it was just my bag (which I did shake up first) or what, but the only flavor in mine was intense anise. It was so strong I got that menthol burn from it. There was a faint underlying earthiness that I think was the chocolate, but it definitely didn’t taste or smell like chocolate. I don’t mind hints of anise, but this was so overpowering that’s the only real flavor I got.

Home – 7:30 PM

The Great Cupboard Excavation
Untasted teas remaining: 16

Time to get back to a couple of these older yet untasted teas! This was one of the limited edition boxes that I got back when T2 had their $5 sale.

I will say, this is just a bit too gingery for me. It does taste nice anyway, though. It’s a bit like ginger ale? There’s also something that reminds me of bubblegum, which sounds awful but isn’t. The citrus is a nice (and classic) pairing with the ginger.

It’s not for me, as a non-lover of ginger, but I do find it somewhat enjoyable and I’m sure someone else who likes ginger would love it.

360/365

This one turned out to be more pleasant than I thought it might be, but then I’m not sure why I didn’t think I’d like it to begin with. A minor trepidation about chocolate teas, maybe? As it happens, it’s a good one! There’s lots of caramel – it actually reminded me very clearly of a Cadbury’s Caramel bar, which can only be a good thing. The caramel tasted smooth and glossy in the same sort of way; sweet, but not overpoweringly so. The chocolate is nice also; a tad artificial, maybe, but at least not watery or weak. While the overall impression is of milk chocolate, there’s a background hint of cocoa that’s really pleasant, and only adds to the overall effect.

I drank today’s cup black, but I think this might make a decent latte. If not, then I like it fine anyway – a good thing, given that I have 100g…

Overall, a really decent cup. One of the better chocolate teas I’ve tried recently.

Pleasant tart berry beverage, nothing stands out to me in particular. Like many others, I didn’t perceive a creamy element in this … until the very, very, very, very last two tiny siplets, when I did detect an interesting creamy note (I think). I suppose what little dregs there were in the bottom of the cup actually contained a bit of the yogurt cream-like ingredient. Maybe next time I’ll leave a bit floating in the cup as an experiment. For Science!

Autumn Harvest! This is another of the ever-dwindling horde of T2 samplers I picked up from their mega-discount last January, when T2 was selling off old holiday stock cheap. I cold-steeped the whole two-serving sampler in 400ml of water overnight and strained the next morning to make a tall, cool glass of iced tea. Even in cool weather, I still prefer fruit teas like this iced, and especially find them a nice accompaniment with warm meals.

This is a very fruit punchy tea, and I do quite like those. It has that strong hibi-hip fruity, punchy base, but I find it hard to pick out a distinct flavor that I’d go, “Oh yes, that is definitely pomegranate!” To me it just sort of tastes like so many other tart and tangy red berry fruit teas I’ve had in the past, the sort that include cranberries and elderberries and have that really crisp and juicy fruity berry finish. But it doesn’t make me think of pomegranates. If I had to place any specific fruit the taste is reminding me of, I’d say cranberries is the most prominent flavor note coming through the fruit punchy base. And since pomegranate seems to be the angle of the tea, that makes me rather unimpressed, even though I’m perfectly fine with tart and tangy red berry fruit teas. But if I want one of those, I can always drink Red Berries by TeaSource, or Cranberry Apple by Metropolitan Tea Co. So, ya, my overall impression is underwhelmed. Even though it’s a perfectly servicable tea, if you want a tangy fruit tea, and aren’t specifically looking for something with a really defined pomegranate flavor.

Tasting as one of a sample pack, and, frankly, to wash the taste of an earlier tea I did not like at all out of my mouth, and I have to say I like this more than I expected. I agree that it is somewhat reminiscent of a fruit leather / fruit rollup sort of flavor and very tart. If you like hibiscus, this is like a gentler, more nuanced, deluxe hibiscus blend. I can see wanting this when I have a cold, for a bright, clear, tart flavor that I could probably still taste even when stuffed up and a nice warming sensation … or on its own or mixed with other flavors for an iced drink or berry-lemonade on a hot day. If I had it, it would not go unused, but it’s a bit pricey for me to spend just to have on hand. Something I might keep in mind, though.

I’m not numerically rating this tea, because it’s entirely possible part of the problem is me and my untrained palate, but having said that, wow, I find this intensely unpleasant, as though I heated up some water that dirty dishes had been soaking in, and drank it. This was part of a sample pack, which I brewed according to package instructions, and am now noting to remind myself: “no, self: you do not want to ever order this in the future.”

Okay, getting a handle on this (and New York Breakfast), and finding I prefer much higher amounts of leaf than I had been using, so like a level(ish) tablespoon (a bit under 4 grams) for two infusions in my 300 ml cup, sweet and a splash of milk is delicious. I’ll definitely be getting this and New York Breakfast the next time I order from T2. Also pertinent: instead of using an infuser in my cup, I used a small teapot. The infuser is pretty big, but free floating then strained is better.

Marking this to come back to later, because I’m a little confused right now. Tried this three or four times (already beginning to forget, which is why I need to keep track!), and had such different reactions: One was, “Wow, so delicious; definitely need to order more”; one was “meh, this tastes like flavored water”; one was “this seems bitter (?), which is not at all how it tasted when I tried it a couple of days ago.” I don’t think my quantities or brewing techniques were markedly different all those times. Mysterious!

Just a quick note, so I can keep track of my thoughts trying many different new teas these days. I love this one. I’m not a big bergamot fan, so classic, straight-up Earl Grey is not really my jam. This is a lovely, fruity variation that still essentially reads “Earl Grey” to my palate, but without the unwelcome bitterness/astringency. I plan on keeping this one on hand unless/until I find an even more pleasing sibling-of-Earl-Grey suitor.

This was a surprising one. It’s interesting to try samples without reading full descriptions, and oddly, the first impression I had from this was “melon” — which is not a flavor I usually want or look for outside of actually eating the real fruit … but I found this delightful. Okay, now I get that this is strawberry, but to me it does not scream strawberry. I do get the creaminess, unexpected (to me) in a green tea, and the fruitiness, which don’t necessarily seem that compatible in my mind (creamy, fruity … green tea??), but for me it really is nice, and I could drink it all day because it’s also light and refreshing.