Tea Desire

The ingredient list of this tea intrigued me so I decided to make this the first tea I tried from the mystery tea box Katiek sent me while I was out of town.

I have to agree that this tastes like black tea plus lemons and that really is a surprising flavor to get out of this tea since lemons are not on the ingredient list. It was pretty disappointing hot so I decided to do a huge pitcher cold steeped and see if any of the other flavors came out. Even after 8 hours they didn’t, but I did notice that the lemon flavor wasn’t as overwhelming (a plus for me since I don’t like lemons). Either way it isn’t a terrible tea, just little disappointing. I’ve been drinking a lot of it the last few days in an effort to sip down my samples and I definitely prefer the cold steep.

I got this tea in a swap from jessiwrites … it is a lot like tropicalia, but quite a bit more tart… i’m not sure I like that.. I think for me there is something about pineapple teas that doesn’t sit right.. I love pineapple, I just haven’t stumbled upon the right pineapple tea for me yet.

Sipdown! 841. Yeah… that number just isn’t decreasing. I haven’t had time to drink much tea lately, and when I do, I don’t want a sample. Sigh.

Anyhow, hot/cold-brewed this, and yuck. Hot, it is definitely reminiscent of Tropicalia, but cold, it gets quite tart, and isn’t sweet at all. Perhaps sweetened it would taste okay, but as a cold-brew, I only finished it because I was desperately thirsty for something cold right then. Dropping the rating – a herbal tea like this has gotta be good cold-brewed!

Thanks to Courtney for a sample of this one! Sadly not a sipdown yet, but hopefully I’ll remember to chill the rest so it’s a sipdown tomorrow.

This pretty much tastes like DT’s Tropicalia, I agree. No candy bits (a bonus) and a bit more tartness, which I wasn’t as fond of. I’d pick Tropicalia over this one most likely, although I really wish it didn’t have candies in it! Whine, whine. However, this is still a pretty reasonably tea, and a far cry from some of the pina colada atrocities I’ve tried.

Thanks to Lynne-tea for a sample of this one, which I think I’ve had previously, though not brewed myself.

This is a lovely example of an earl grey cream. Light on the bergamot, heavy on the creaminess and vanilla; I would swear that someone put cream in my tea. No bitterness at all with a 3-minute infusion. This is pretty darn delicious – delicious enough that I may very well pick this one up as my go-to EGC once I drink down what I have (which consists mostly of small samples from various places, including Upton).

Very tasty. Thanks again for the sample, Lynne-tea! Much appreciated :D

Sipdown! Honestly though, I drank this tea cool and quickly, and although it was good, I probably can’t make any more comments on it. I’d drink it again, but it wasn’t anything overly special.

Thanks again to Lynne-tea for a delicious tea sample :D

I was most interested in this tea because it contained dragonwell (and I adore dragonwell), but now that I’m a bit more knowledgeable, I know that the flavours of dragonwell really don’t lend themselves to flavourings. However, this tea works quite well. It’s basically coming off as a strawberry-flavoured green, which is quite pleasant (although…. tiger town???) There’s a hint of green tea flavour lingering in the aftertaste, but the base really isn’t very prominent. Overall pretty tasty, but not something I’d purchase myself.

Old sipdown #8. Wrote a good review on this prior, yay! I don’t remember it at all…

Thanks to Lynne-tea for some of this one! I’m making a good effort on my box from you today :D

So, lately I’ve been off of cinnamony/orangey teas, but I figured I’d give this one a shot anyways. And to my surprise, I really like it! I suspect the flavour is a bit muted due to age, but for whatever reason, I am really enjoying how everything works together. I’m tasting chocolatey flavours plus just a hint of spice and floral. I suppose that I haven’t actually ever had a cinnamon/chocolate/rose tea before. There was one “loop” in the infuser for this cup… I’m not sure what flavour(s) it may have contributed.

Either way, this was pretty tasty! I’ll probably enjoy my second cup of it in the rather near future, since I found it to be so enjoyable. (Yay, that means sipdown is imminent! The only problem is that none of these teas were in my cupboard count, as this swap arrived when I was very busy last year, and I just didn’t get around to noting down everything that I was sent. Sigh.)

Thanks for this one, Lynne-tea! I’m hoping to get through everything you sent at least once by the end of tonight (assuming nothing has been misplaced elsewhere. There was a random sample from momo in the box too, which was odd.)

Love it! You can really taste the mango bits in it.

So I got this tea in our tea crawl and swap. I grabbed this one up when it was offered, and I am glad I did! I love the Coffee Pu Erh from DAVIDs, and this is similar, minus the coffee beans, so it is a bit less acidic in that respect.

What I love about this tea is seeing the bits of caramel. I’m a sucker for that, heh.

I love adding milk and sugar to pu erhs because they are so dark and rich, they really holdup well to it. This one is pretty sweet by itself, but not for me, so I did use sugar, but less than normal.

I’d rate this pretty good, pretty comparable, but it is so close to DT’s Coffee Pu Erh, and I can get that locally, that I probably wouldn’t purchase this unless it was local too.

Thanks to Morgan, who I don’t think is on Steepster, but came over from Vancouver with OMGsrsly.

i dind’t realize that i’d had this one before until i looked at the tasting notes for this one. i have to say that this time around, i’m find it less appealing. theres something about the smell that is just turning me off, though to be fair it might just be that whole being sick factor. i was looking for something with a little kick to it, but tonight this is just feeling weak and sweet. weirdness. chalking it up to not being well.

(oh thanks for sending this my way roswell strange!)

SIPDOWN!

this is a smelly tea that gives me a headache lol so it’s been lockewd away in a tupperware container since kittenna was kind enough to let me steal a sample haha.

This is…..interesting lol I actually wish the smell wasn’t so intense because i think? it’s a blend i’d really enjoy drinking. it’s just hard to tell since the smell is telling my taste buds conflicting things.

This is a sweet blend with just a hint of chai spicey flavour at the end of the cup. I would drink this again but for the smell of the tea that I just can’t get past. It’s quite delicious.

Morning steepster-ers. I finally made a cup of tea after hours of wishing for one proved tea-less.

This is a really mellow/subtle flavour with a really strong black tea. So don’t go in expecting dessert tea. :P It’s good though, but not cupboard-necessary.

Having this iced with a bunch of honey added, and a little club soda to top up the glass. Will not buy again. Just not my cup of tea. :)

So while I can’t stand this as a hot tea, and cold steeped it’s nothing to write home about either, it works really well following DavidsTea’s Tea Pop recipe!

1.5 tbsp tea, 1/2 cup-ish water. A 16 oz mug half filled with ice. Steep the tea as per the instructions (temp and time), pour over ice, add 1 cup club soda.

I also added about 1 tsp honey to this one, as I know I don’t care for the tea. And… SUCCESS! So happy I can drink this tea up now. It tastes mostly of vanilla, with hints of berry. Yum.

This one is another quite sour, rather acidic fruity tisane. Unfortunately, it makes my tummy upset, so I’ll be giving away most of what I have left to a friend who likes the sour fruity ones.

The strawberry and apple flavours mix really well with the vanilla, but the sour acid flavour unfortunately ruins it for me. I had high hopes for this as a hot tea, but I think it might do best as a cold infused iced tea. I’m keeping some just to try the other brewing method out.