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Daily sipper choice. Upfront… Unfortunately, this one is not for me. When I opened the thermos, it smelled perfumey, flowery and like cough syrup, medicinal. Those two aromas are bothersome to me. It was mainly the aroma though. The taste wasn’t quite as medicine-y. I got the sweet and tart raspberry notes, no cookie or almond notes though.

I have more so I will play around with the temperature and time to see if I can get a different result.

I started this in the morning and well, due to many things, my gongfu session was broken up, and one of my cats stepped on my phone and I lost count on which steep I was on, blahblahblah lol. So I restarted a new one.

The tea leaves are really pretty, mixed colors with gold in it. When I opened the package, the dry tea leaves smelled like hay, sweet hay. In the cup, the dry leaves had a malt, cocoa aroma, less hay. After the rinse, the lid and leaves had a nice cocoa, malty aroma.

As I continued, other things came in… Hints of citrus and their rind, stone fruits aroma and flavors. The lid smelled of honey, brown sugar and molasses. As I progressed, I didn’t get lots of chocolate, I did get some in the beginning. There was always a lot of malt notes. (It could be because last night I had their Cocoa Amore which has an abundance of chocolate. Everything is relative. hehe) The aroma was progressively getting stronger in fruits, particularly stone fruits. I didn’t get the tart apple or honeydew as described and unfortunately I have no idea what wildflowers taste like hehe.

The mouthfeel changed from silky, creamy to clean… Not a lot of astringency nor bitterness. It had a long finish no matter what infusion I was on, and as I was sitting here reading the reviews, I could smell orange, orange rind, cherry, stone fruits and molasses on the inhale-exhale well after I finished the infusion. In the middle of these infusions, it reminded me of the Moonlight raw pu’er from Teavivre because of the strong presence of stone fruits but with lots of malt and some creaminess. All in all, it was a good several cups of tea.

7g, 212°F, 110ml, rinse, 10 steeps: 10s, 15s, 20s, 25s, 35s, 45s, 55s, 65s, 75s, 120s

When I was little I used to eat those Japanese jelly gel-cup candies. You know, the kind that they have warnings on them now, that you can choke on them if you swallow it whole. Luckily I didn’t choke on any of them. lol The two types I liked were the grape flavored ones and the other the ever-popular mango ones. This tea kind of sort of reminds me of the grape ones.

It doesn’t taste nearly as artificial as the Muscat which tasted a lot like grape soda. This one has a good sencha base, and it doesn’t have quite the candy-soda-like taste but more of a realistic grape flavor. This one and the Yamabudo (Mountain grape) oolong are both pretty good. The Muscat would be good to those who like Fanta grape soda. It has a slight bitterness to it that mimics the slip-skin part of the Budou (humongous almost black grapes). It’s super aromatic like the others but the flavor is mild.

So I finished going through all the “grape” Lupicias. I think I like the Yamabudou over the Bodou Green over the Muscat.

I received this free sample. It came in a pouch, with good labeling and a 7.5 g serving. Lots of reviews, but looks like I’m somewhat of an outlier.^^

The dry leaves had a great aroma of molasses, cocoa, spices, malt, nuts. After the rinse, the lid smelled even better, along the same lines but with the addition of fried plantains and sweet potatoes. It remained flavorful to the end with constant changes throughout all the infusions. It was complex and I was glad I did shorter infusions in the beginning. Sweet potatoes were the main constant from beginning to end. Notes of roasted nuts, molasses, dark chocolate, bittersweet and sweet chocolate, malt, toast, a little citrus here and there, plums, caramel, spices too. It was a smooth and creamy mouthfeel in the beginning and then that changed too. Their site says it gives a “glassy” mouthfeel. It never got bitter nor astringent.

110ml porcelain gaiwan, put the entire 7.5g in it., 205°F, rinse, 11 steeps: 5s, 10s, 15s, 20s, 25s, 35s, 45s, 55s, 65s, 75s, 120s.

I love grapes. I ate at least 2 lbs of them this week alone and the week isn’t over lol. Yeah, yeah call me a piglet.

So, I bought every kind of grape (Muscat) Lupicia that was available, just to try before they go bye-bye. I’m watching the Tea spending discussion on the forum, I won’t dare write what I spent this month but I watch to make myself feel better for my many “momentary lapse(s) of reason” lol. (Pink Floyd)

This one came the other day (last Lupicia shipment… For real.) and all I have to say is if you don’t mind the artificial grape flavor, and you love candy grape, you’ll probably like this tea. Sometimes I don’t mind grape taffy but that’s candy. It’s like grape soda. The black tea base is nice though, carries it well. Unfortunately, I don’t know much about black tea to tell you more about it.

Right now, I prefer the Mountain Grape (Yamabudo) Oolong over this one because of that. I still have the Grape Green to try that’s waiting in my tea drawer. o.O

Edited and updated: I tried this a couple of days after Cameron B. wrote a review on it. I didn’t take notes but I agree that I couldn’t taste much, if any, vanilla in it. I recently had the sipdown of this. It was better than I remembered. It had malt notes, a little dried fried taste, chestnut notes too. I tried it cold brew and it’s way better that way. As Cameron wrote, I wouldn’t classify it as vanilla. It’s better than their “Vanilla” although there are no vanilla notes. Their Vanilla is far too artificial tasting while this one is not.

Sipped this while watching Bohemian Rhapsody. Such a good movie.

Really nice ginger tea. I put ginger in almost everything I cook, especially in my rice congee. It’s a subtle tea, very smooth. Floral but not too much. Citrusy but not too much. Balanced and the ginger is the star in this one. I was worried that some tasted Jasmine because I can enjoy a little of it but not a lot. No problem in that department. Lovely morning tea if you like Ginger.

Thank you Cameron B.!

This was today’s daily sipper.

I got the grape aroma as soon as I opened up my thermos. At first, I thought I put in the wrong tea because of it.

Although the aroma was of strong grapes, the flavor was not. The notes I got were citrus, orange, dried fruit… Fruity in general, and raisins with honey notes. My favorite part was the oats notes (rhymes lol). The after taste stayed with me long after the sip. It reminded me of a good bowl of fruit oatmeal. It was sweet, creamy mouthfeel and smooth. I didn’t get the scone-like essence or hint of cream flavor as I had hoped though. Enjoyable though. :)

I received this free sample from them in my most recent order. It came in a pouch, with good labeling and a generous 7-8 g serving.

Oh no. Yikes. I’m the first one to review this. ^^

The dry leaves are elongated, twisted, dark, wire-y. The wet leaves, in the beginning, had a prominent floral aroma, almost perfumey. The liquor is a bright orange color. Early steeps I got a bit of baked bread, sweet plantains, honey, toast, but quite a bit of daylily notes as described on their site. For a couple of steeps, it started getting a little perfumey but that stage passed. The lid began losing the perfumey aroma and started smelling like sweet potatoes. By the fifth infusion, it was a wonderful full-on sweet potatoes yummy smell and on the 7th infusion, the lid smelled of freshly baked bread and sweet potatoes, the flavor profile mimicked the aroma. The floral notes were still there but not as prominent as before. I really began enjoying this tea in those middle stages on. As I progressed, the spices came out more, the floral exiting a bit, but was always there, the malty comforting side of the savory spectrum entered, some astringency but not a lot.

Delightful cup(s) of tea… Especially after my rice and steak stir-fry.

7g, 212°F, 110ml, rinse, 11 steeps: 5s, 10s, 15s, 20s, 25s, 35s, 45s, 55s, 65s, 75s, 120s

Had this last night. 3 g in 12 oz, the first infusion was the recommended and the 2nd infusion much much much longer. Maybe an hour? :P

It’s good and the fig notes are there. Like the others, I’d love more fig in it. The oolong is nice because I don’t typically like over the floral type of oolongs where in this one it’s the fruity notes in the forefront and the floral in the background.