The Boston Tea Company

Quiet. Deliciously quiet. No air conditioning needed. Neighborhood is shutting down for the evening. Nothing but crickets.

…

That has nothing to do with this tasty tea, but I wanted you to enjoy the stillness with me.

My packet is getting so old, I had to check to confirm this is still available from Boston Tea, which it is. It’s like Sunday morning sweet rolls. Not overly sugary, the almonds aren’t bitter, and smoooooth. Not for weekday mornings when you need booted awake, but slow weekend mornings on the back porch? Perfect.

Finally. Feet up with a lovely cup of cookie sweetness. But it’s “proper tea biscuit cookie” sweetness; not pastry-shop sweetness. The flavor balance tips toward almond. Oh—like those windmill-shaped cookies with the almond slices in them. Remember those? Grandma used to get ‘em. (My week has been filled with “Mom used to…” or "Grandma used to’s.")

Sweet. Gentle. Flavor-accurate. You need to have this. You need to have this with cookies.

Changing up the morning routine is good for your moldering brain, so I hear, so I closed my eyes and grabbed a random packet this morning. This one won the morning lottery. It doesn’t have boot-you-out-the-door strength (few ooolongs do), but is sweet and delicate; has the personality of a little imported tea biscuit.

I am consistently impressed by the quality of the Boston Teas I’ve tried…not a zonker yet.

Nice nutty afternoon cuppa. All the flavors are very subtle and understated; I get a lot more almond than I do vanilla. But it’s not a bitter almond (as in Adagio, which I never could get quite right.)

Boston Tea, at least those varieties I’ve tried, is consistently good. This one would be a good afternoon chat-and-tea-party selection:

http://www.itsallabouttheleaf.com/2784/tea-review-boston-tea-company-vanilla-almond-oolong/

This packet looked lonely and needed a little love. Sencha with fruit and flowers, although I will contend that pineapple is a misnomer because it doesn’t come through as the primary flavor. A more appropriate island-y name? Hmmm…Island Blossom; Hawaiian Lei…? Something like that. There’s enough to hang on to until hot weather (will there ever be hot weather? Remind me of that in August) and try chilled. Bet it’s better that way.

Found the other half-packet of this while prowling through wilderness of the back half of my tea cabinet. Now that the temps are spiking, I’m craving lighter, greener, oolonger varieties, and this fits the bill nicely.

It’s a good quality sencha and when you taste it, your brain says, “cool, tropical!” It does not necessarily say, “ah-hah! I’m tasting pineapple.” The flavors and florals counteract any heavy vegetal taste that might normally come with the sencha.

Review up: http://www.itsallabouttheleaf.com/2557/tea-review-boston-tea-pineapple-paradise/

(It was written, as you’ll see, quite a while ago — but if you’ve got a bad case of the December blues and need something to lift the clouds a little, maybe a little tropical “vacation” might be in order.)

Left this in the fridge overnight instead of just a few hours and it went a little bit bitter. As always, though, with iced tea, a little bite is no big deal as long as it’s COLD. (Oh, for one stray chilly foggy day to wander through and remind us what the weather is like somewhere other than Hades :)

Cold steeped a quart of this in the fridge. It’s tasty chilled. The fruit flavors aren’t tart at all—more what you get in a cranberry-lemon muffin or bread. My husband, a cranberry lover, on the other hand, didn’t care for it. He wants tea that is tartly or strongly oversteeped to the point that makes my eyebrows sweat. (I heard or read the phrase “beloved incompatible” once. Guess it fits with tea preferences, too.)

Mmmm. Good, clear, authentic fruit flavors. Needs a muffin to go with it.

Logging and thumbs-upping, this one’ll show up on www.itsallabouttheleaf.com later.

This one is waiting for a full review at itsallabouttheleaf.com, but quite tasty—made a pot big enough to ice down when weather gets warm this afternoon, but I don’t think it’s going to last that long.

This Is a good good tea that is there and not over the top,and the apricot is a medium taste and good and natural tasting. This Is pretty good.

Thought I’d be more sad to see this go, but the final pot was a bit meh. I even left the risqué to infuse while I drank the pot and it’s just not blowing my socks off. Enjoyable raspberry flavor, just missing anything extrodinairy. Another tea decupboarded tonight.

This is an herbal blend right up my alley. A nice sweet cup of raspberry with a slight apple sweetness to it. There is a bit of a tartness from the hibiscus but it is not overpowering the berry. Thank you TeaEqualsBliss for sending some my way.

Backlogging This is a fairly good spearmint tea with abit of gunpowder.

I’m kind of on the fence about this tea, so I’m not going to give it a numeric rating just yet.

I like the idea behind this tea – because back before I discovered the joy of tea, I used to drink hot water with a squeeze of lemon and a drizzle of honey when I had a sore throat to help soothe it. This is kind of that same, soothing idea, but with some other ingredients to make it a little more interesting than a cup of hot water with lemon and honey.

It’s ok, but I can’t say I love this one. I will give it another chance in a few days or so and see if I like it better. It’s not bad… just not my favorite right now.

Horrid.

Absolutely horrid.

I can taste the jasmine flavoring, and jasmine teas should not be flavored they should be scented. This tea was flavored, and I can taste it, and it is disgusting.

If I could rate this lower than one, I would. It deserves something in the negative digits.

Another from my box o tea from LiberTeas several years ago. Initially it smells as though it has been scent contaminated with all the rest, but when steeped 2.5 minutes it smells definitely like black tea with light citrus. More like cleaner than fresh fruit, but not unappealing. It looks and smells like a tea that will get bitter if over-steeped so I was careful with the time.

First sips yield a fairly typical black tea that starts out a bit sweet and then goes a bit astringent, with some light citrus in the background. Considering the age and storage of this sample, I am impressed that there are any flavours to distinguish at all. In the aftertaste I get a sense of bergamot but it is very light and not dusty at all the way bergamot can sometimes be.

This is a very pleasant (if mild) cuppa, and I will definitely be able to finish the sample. Yay!

So last night when I was placing my Adagio sample order, I contemplated their Apricot Green until I remembered that I have a sample of a similar blend from Momo! So into a cup for an overnight cold brew it went.

This tea reminds me of something I’ve tried before almost exactly, but I can’t place what it is. Infuriating! I’m pretty sure I never logged whatever this mystery tea was so I’ve spent 20 minutes glaring angrily at my cup as if it will give up the answer. Funnily enough, I don’t think it was another apricot blend, but a flavored green with fruit of some kind. Oh well.

This is a nice enough tea, though I don’t know if I’d know it was apricot without being told first. A little fruity, but the base dominates. Oddly enough, I’d swear the taste was changing as I work through my cup. With one sip it’s very plum-like, then I get a hint of real apricot, then it’s just generic fruity tasting. If nothing else, this is a big ’ol cup of mystery!