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I can’t say I’ve ever had brandy, so I can’t really compare.

It’s creamy, sooo creamy and smooth. There’s a maltiness there that makes it taste close to a black tea, but without the bam in the face that blacks can give you. Like a gentle wake up call to the soul.

It’s not at all astringent when brewed according to directions, but there’s a drying aspect to it that makes my throat hurt. It’s nice, but at this point not particularly memorable (yet). I’m not sure I’ll repurchase, but it was a lovely experience.

TeaLux is now TeaLyra. I wonder if I will remember that next time I brew up one of their teas.

For some reason, while I was perfectly aware that it was a black tea when I was ordering, I was expecting a green base when I brewed it up. The fault of this is that the dry leaf don’t really smell deep and cocoa-y as I tend to look for in black teas. Not much of this shows up in the brewed tea either. Is this what they call a China Black?

It just tastes like tea to me. Like that sweet mild familiar taste of tea with a hit of lychee on it. I guess this would be the closest to the type of teas I grew up on, because I can’t think that it’s anything but Tea, and why mess with such a wonderful descriptor like that? It also makes it a great tea to pair with food, because it doesn’t overwhelm my sense of the food, but it’s strong enough to cleanse the palate.

It’s mild, sweet, comforting.

The first brew was mildly artificial though, I might have to do a initial rinse with this tea from now on. It used to be a habit, but as I tried more and more flavored teas I dropped the habit. The second brew was wonderful and perfect. I used 1 tsp for a small teapot (12oz). The pearls were quite large to my eye, perhaps .7mm in diameter.

I can see myself drinking this alot and wonder how it’ll stand up to grandpa style brewing.

Catching up on some notes.

I admit that when I requested this sample with my last Adagio order I was NOT expecting an herbal blend. It seems to me that alot of companies do their variation on Blood Orange on a black base, so this caught me by surprise.

The result is characteristic of that blood orange flavor, and had I added sweetener I’m sure that resemblance would increase. Straight, this was fairly tart to the taste, but not overwhelmingly so.

I took a tsp of this when I had the Marco Polo TTB. It was rather cold today and when I got out of work it was super dark outside so I really wanted to be reminded of spring. Also- my first try of RiverTeas!

Maybe because the sample was old- I was trying to drink a spring tea in late autumn. I didn’t get very much in the way of strong flavor from my brew. I also may have underleafed, but I followed the package directions! There were LOTS of jasmine flowers and other things scattered in with the green tea leaves. In the end though it only tasted like a vaguely floral and vaguely sweet green tea. I was really hoping for something similar to Sakurabo (sp?) from Lupicia. That’s one really cherry tea! I think that cherry-ness plus jasmine on a green base would be really pretty.

A plus at least for RiverTea, they use fairly large and intact jasmine flowers in this. I was expecting more from the tea because of that, but I guess they are mostly decorative. I’ve had jasmine teas in many forms, and this is among the most pretty (excepting blooming teas, of course).

Oh! This is soo good!

I got this via my sweet Secret Pumpkin Michelle. Thank you!

Usually I steer away from chai teas, too much milk and heaviness for me to handle. But this was perfect! From the sprinkles I was afraid it might have other sweeteners in it, but I didn’t really detect any after brewing. Another thing- I tend to steer away from DavidsTea, mostly because of the three I tried before, two were overwhelmingly sweet and I passed the rest of the sample on to someone else.

Pumpkins though, I’m a big fan of pumpkin. Yesterday, the first day of November, I went and got myself three lovely medium sized pumpkins that I can save and bake up it delightful things until they all run out. The pumpkin in this tea makes reminds me when I’m actually prepping my pumpkins, that slight bit between having completely raw pumpkin and completely cooked pumpkin where it’s just on the edge of sweet and juicy and a little savory.

There’s something about this base too. I set a timer! I did! But my sisters distracted me and when I got back my timer told me I was 10 min overdue. So this steeped for about 13 min. Not bitterness or astringency at all. Best of all, although all the sprinkles were dissolved, it didn’t taste that much different in the 2nd or 3rd steep! This is a thing I can definitely see myself finishing off and getting more of. I’ve already looked at the site to see how much it would cost me!

I had this one yesterday while relaxing in the water. Sometimes after a long week with many long hours I like to take a very hot bath, quickly followed by a very cold one. The hot bath helps release some of the tension in my muscles, and it’s just nice to be warm after getting drenched in the rain yesterday. The cold bath is what’s really helpful though. It soothes the aches and mild swelling in my lower back and just lowers my body temperature a little bit so it’s easy to just slip into the blankets and fall asleep right away.

Warm tea, cool bath, soft lighting. Soo comforting. =)

It’s a teapot and tea cup day! I haven’t had a chance to sit down and enjoy a full teapot for awhile. I’ve mostly been mug and thermos brewing lately, or using my inguinetea.

Malty, sweet, robust. Maybe just a tad astringent, but that’s totally my fault. I’ve been avoiding black teas lately because they tend to go bitter on me because I forget to take the leaves out too often. Oolongs and greens are much more forgiving. I’m surprised that this still turned a bit bitter on me, I guess the first cup out of the pot didn’t completely clear the water level from the brewing basket.

As you would think, the dry leaf is tightly curled into little pearls, soo precious. The leaves unfurled are mostly whole, about 1.5in from tip to stem. The color is a dark chocolate brown.

If I had anymore pumpkins, this would be the tea I would make pumpkin pie for. Unfortunately for me, the market ran out of small pumpkins 3 weeks ago.

A tsp I took from Marco Polo TTB

I didn’t get very much out of this one, unfortunately. It was mild, vegetal, a little sweet.
Maybe I need to put half a cup of leaves in my mug like they do at teavana.

I’m certainly not the best candidate for reviewing such teas. I’ve decided now that I just don’t like the smokiness of certain teas, and lapsang souchong falls under that category. It smells like burning wood! I don’t know, it’s just not appealing to me. It just screams RUN AWAY RUN AWAY!!

Once I can get past the smokiness of this tea though, there is essentially nothing wrong with it… It’s got a nice texturity (if such a word exists). It’s kind of dry on the tongue and yet smooth on the finish. Like an old fashioned bourbon with bitters. Not that this tastes like bourbon at all. Minus the smokiness I’m reminded of when we drove through Avenue of the Giants. Smells like nature and the smallest bit of freeway.

I’ll keep it around for the ‘every once in awhile’, but it’s definitely not top of my list. but I don’t completely dislike it either. I guess it tastes like trees. lol.

On a side note, we won the World Series! Go Giants! Of course it would rain (POUR) on the day of the parade. Maybe the weather is celebrating with us and it’ll signal the end of the drought. A girl can dream?

Marco Polo TTB

I’m assuming this year’s is the one in the package, although no year is specified.

The name of this tea makes me wonder. I always assumed that most all tea is hand picked, but I guess not? Hehe, that gave me a vision of someone using some sort of lawn mower type contraption to cut leaves. But doesn’t tea grow on trees? =P

The taste of this is light, and I would say that it’s slightly faded a little. The dried leaves were tightly curled into little caterpillar like shapes. They didn’t fully unfurl until the second steep, but those leaves were quite large! Maybe an inch and a half from tip to stem.

As I said though, the taste was somewhat faded for me. The liquor was a pale green and turned more yellow as the steep grew longer. It was faintly sweet and faintly floral, just pretty light all around even when I just let it sit in the cup, it was still quite light. The taste was actually rather one sided for me, but I can’t even tell you want that note is.
The mouthfeel is not full, nor creamy, but it leaves a satisfying finish, clean.

A tea to sake the thirst, but not one that leaves me guessing, or really wanting more.

I made a pumpkin bread with cranberries. It looks quite pretty. I was hoping that this tea would be a robust enough to drink with it, but I guess I’ll have to go look for something a bit heartier.