Upton Tea Imports
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Another selection from the wonder tea box I got from Azzrian! She is amazingly generous, but I’m almost at the end! Thanks Azz!
Didn’t really care much for this one hot, either plain, with stevia, or with stevia & french vanilla coconut milk creamer. I’m trying a cold brew with the rest of the sample. I’ll get back to you with the results.
I was going to write this in my Dragonwell note, but I figured that’s not fair. I’ve been having some bum sessions with pu’erh and oolongs, ones I should like, that I know are good quality, but they haven’t shined for me lately, nothing has stood out. Perhaps it’s my water?
On a more uplifting note either Friday or Saturday, Rowan suggested we have a tea party. He brought me his little cup and creamer and even grabbed my little silver filigree over the cup strainer. He wanted tea with milk as opposed to raspberry tea which is his usually request. So I gave him options, he chose Baker Street Blend from Upton Tea. He chose this not for his love of Sherlock Holmes, but because we live on Baker Street.
He thoroughly enjoyed it and kept asking for more, I probably reinfused it four times, though his tiny cup was usually half full with milk. I don’t think I had tried this one with milk before, but it was quite nice. So after tea and waffles Rowan announces he wants to play a game, Jenga and Clue together. Now this is something we’ve played before though more often than not we play them separately.
Yes, my three and a half year old loves playing Clue though it has taken a lot to get him to not say what he has out loud and mark his sheet correctly (it is a 8 yr+ game). And he mostly just loves building wonky towers with the Jenga blocks. However the first time Rowan saw these two games we were playing them together at my sisters house. Now due to the irony of the tea and the game I had to explain the Sherlock- Baker Street thing to him. He’s seen Great Mouse Detective but I don’t think he’s ready for BBC or Robert Downey Jr.
seriously?!? this is the best post!
i loved Clue when i was young and my sisters and i played it often. over and over on a repeat loop. (either that or if we wanted more action we would go for Trapdoor.)
And you live on Baker Street hah so cool!
(i have plans to re-taste this tea very soon soon soon)
My youngest daughter just finished her large tin of Baker Street that I bought for her in September. I bought the Rafferty song on iTunes when I first got this tea. Ha! She liked the Holmes reference but she really, really loves the tea. Once she drinks down some more of her Lapsang, I will order her more.
There’s a ton of this in the traveling tea box so I figured I had to try it. Haven’t been a fan lately of red rooibos of any sort.
I figured this sounded different enough…flowers and hibiscus, kind of weird. I figured since I should probably end my tea-filled day with a tisane, this one would work. Steeped it for five minutes, and it didn’t look like it’d be super rooibosy.
It’s a good bit different, the hibiscus isn’t terrible, instead, it kind of gives it a fruity taste. The floral notes aren’t very strong, I kind of wish they had a bit more of a pop.
Since there’s a bunch in here I’ll probably save enough for 2-3 cups and move it along. It’s a good bit different than most other rooibos blends. It’s not like super flavored, but for something more subtle it still covers a good bit of the flavors of rooibos I can’t stand.
Maybe I got a bad batch or something. I don’t get any of the flavors Upton mentions in their description or that other folks here on Steepster mention.
It was a fine, standard black tea. But no citrus and no bergamot. Hm.
Preparation
Yay! My first plain pu-erh! Just got a boatload of samples in the mail I ordered for upton….
The steeped cup smells very earthy and almost mushroomish. Color is very dark like coffee. I added a small amount of sugar because I like sugar in my black teas so I assume I will for pu-erh as well.
The flavor is rich and earthy. Not very astringent. Almost musty but not in a bad way. Not sure how I feel about this tea honestly! It’s so different!
Upton excels at unflavored black tea and black tea blends. Not so much, based on my experience, with flavored teas. The cherry in this one is a Coke-syrupy cherry. Drinkable if you’re light on leaf and steep time. Still haven’t iced it down, but I think that’s when this one would be best.
What about you? Is there a flavored Upton tea that’s actually tasty?
First whiff caused me to expect one of those nasty cough-syrupy, fake-cherry experiences. What is it about cherry that is hard to replicate accurately?
Wasn’t quite as bad as all that. It still doesn’t taste like fresh cherry pie…more like a warm Sonic cherry slush.
Assuming that someday warm weather will come (I’m beginning to wonder, but I’ll hang on to the fantasy), I think I’ll set the rest of the sample back for chilling and blending. Hot, it didn’t do much for me.
Upton’s plain black teas are excellent…not having so much success with their flavored ones, especially anything fruity.
