Featured & New Tasting Notes

The first thing I noticed when I opened the tin is how oily the leaves look, like the whole container was dropped in a pot of sesame oil. The smell made me think of Chinese food, or maybe teriyaki. When I started steeping though, the smell reverted back to being just like a bag full of sesame seeds.

I goofed on the steeping time so I’m not sure how long it was, but it’s probably somewhere around four minutes. When I rescued it, the surface of the ‘tea juice’ (ha!) was covered in a distinct sheen of oil. The flavour is very much like what I’d expect toasted sesame to taste like; so Adagio gets points for authenticty. It seems to also work quite well with the tanins in the tea base.

This isn’t a flavour I’m used to tasting in my tea (obviously) so my tongue is sending my brain rather mixed signals and confuzzling the poor dear. I think I’m leaning towards liking it, but not loving it – further testing is required! ;)

Ahh yes! The plot thickens! So in my quest to purchase another container of St. James Tea, I discovered that St. James is just a wholesale distributer that gets their breakfast tea from a tea blender by the name of Keith Spicer Ltd. www.keith-spicer.co.uk I noticed it at the bottom of the St. James Teas web page. After visiting Kieth Spicer Ltd.‘s website I saw that Ashby’s of London is another tea retailer. I’m going to try Ashby’s Breakfast Blend tea to see if it tastes the same as the St. James. When I love a tea, I’m willing to get all Sherlock Holmes with it to keep my cupboards nicely stocked. “Watson, I do believe we are on to something…”

A great start to the morning, this black tea offering from Shang is pretty good and is on the lighter side of the black tea spectrum since it is made using his white tea leaves.

Light and mildly grassy. I can understand those who say that this tastes buttery to them. I’m not talking about a stick of butter here, but it is a little creamy and has depth. Not an everyday tea for me…but then again, I think I’m on a black tea kick right now.

DH loves mango. Like, a lot. Like, he gets it in bulk from Costco. So I’ve met a lot of mangoes. Fortunately, I like them too (not the buy-in-bulk level but still well enough). Anyway, this tea does taste like mango. Not quite like the super-ripe, making-a-little-puddle-of-sticky-syrup-in-the-fridge mango. More like the mostly-ripe-but-a-lighter-yellow-color-and-a-little-fibrous-towards-the-center mango. These types of mangoes are still good mangoes, they just have a slightly different flavor. And that flavor is pretty much exactly how this tea tastes.

Bought this at a TOPS yesterday in Fredonia, NY. They had 4 Revolution Teas for sale. 2 I have tried and then 2 others – could only buy one…not much cash on me…so I sprung for this one! Glad I did. It’s stronger than a Lady Grey but not Bergamotty like the super strong Earl Grey’s. It’s a nice blend of Earl Grey and Lavender. Glad I bought it.

This is another single sourced tea from The Simple Leaf. This one is from Arunchal Pradesh in India, which is high in the mountains north of Assam and west of Bhutan along the Chinese Indian border. One of the nice things about these single sourced teas is that they are kind of an adventure in a cup. I fantasize about the beauty of these mountainous areas as I sip.

This tea has beautiful, large twisted leaves that smell of chocolate and raisins. It brews into a golden red liquor with scents of chocolate, toast, slight note of malt and the sweetness of tea. It has a very light mild flavor with chocolate notes. It is quite good.

Reminiscent of a very high quality Darjeeling, but with stronger tannins. The flavor blooms and expands in your mouth. Woodsy, oak-like scent to the dry leaf and liquor. Light like a Darjeeling or a crisp Chardonnay, but fully flavored with layers of depth in taste and aroman

This tea is yummmy. I was trying to find a bagged version of my favorite dim sum tea so that I could enjoy it at school. Somewhat difficult to find without knowing Chinese characters, but after standing in the tea aisle long enough, I picked up this box and whaddayaknow!

Anyway, this tea is great, not too sweet, not too bitter. I have tried Ten Ren’s chrysanthemum tea and found it way to sweet. Their combination with Pu-erh is spot on!

I’m a huge fan of spearmint so this is a great tea for me. While it doesn’t exactly put me to sleep it’s great when you’re winding down after dinner.

ive never tried a “run of the mill” green tea before this is all i have to go off on. normally im not a green tea drinker, but i enjoy this. i think its the spices in it that make me like it because they do stand out to me. its a very light tea, i prefer mine stronger so maybe next time ill go for a longer steep time. i am enjoying this as i do my chemistry lab report (yuck)
the color is a pale greeny color that i find very pleasing to the eyes and the smell is wonderful, again i think it’s the spices. ive got to say this was a good purchase on my part. hopefully steepster can help me open up to more green teas :)

If you like the flavor of cloves, you should love this tea. I’ve enjoyed it before but I just had a “critical cup”—i.e. one in which I thought about the qualities of the tea instead of just slurping it down. It’s one of the richest rooibos teas I’ve enjoyed. I let it steep for a long time and then drank it slowly. As time passed, the cloves became the dominant aroma and taste. That’s great for me because I’ve always loved clove.
I think that this will become one of those teas that I must have in stock—a destination tea for when I need to be perked up in the evening and caffeine is verboten.

DH isn’t feeling well – his sinuses are attempting to secede – and I wanted tea, so I thought I’d combine tea-ness with being the good wifey. Takgoti sent me some of this and it is currently the only mint I have and mint is friendly to sinuses so I thought this would be a perfect time to try this out.

The dry leaf smells a bit like a chai so I was nervous I was about to fry DH’s sinuses instead of help them, but I went ahead. While I was pouring, I got a fantastic whiff of mint. But not plain ole mint. Refreshing mint. Mint with that fantastic feeling of cold whoosh.

Now, because this is ultimately being made for DH, I did add about a quarter teaspoon of sugar in there. Because, unless it is TheraFlu, I feel that any drink taken for medicinal purposes must be sweetened at least a little bit. I blame Mary Poppins. Normally, I would add honey but I’m really to lazy to do that right now.

Oh the taste! Minty and refreshing and wonderful. But better than plain mint. The spices give it a great full flavor without making me feel like I’m drinking a chai. I can’t pick out the individuals spices – they aren’t as strong tasting as the dry tea smells like they will be – but they combine with the mint to give this wonderful fresh feeling/taste without being obnoxious.

This is by far the best mint tea I’ve ever had. I rarely drink mint (I’m anti-peppermint as a general rule) but I definitely think I’m going to have to get some of this to have on hand because it is quite awesome. DH actually finished his cup before I did which is pretty much unheard of in this house. He did request I brew it a little stronger next time. I think that will be no problem. Initially I was hesitant to brew too long because of the spices involved, but after seeing how the flavors combine, I think a longer brew time will be happy-making.

Angrboda has a tea, that she calls her celebrating tea.
I guess this is my celebrating tea. When I feel like spoiling myself, I take this out.
It’s just ubër.

Where to start? The color is beautifull.
It’s Red/Golden. A truly red tea, living up to the name “Big Red Rope”. Love the name, it gives it a very ancient feeling ;) The smell is hard to descibe. It somehow reminds me of coffee and yet not at all! I guess the closest thing to descibing the smell would be dirt/musk/salt/coffee/brown cake. Confussing? Indeed.

The taste is not less confusing.
I earlier reviewed a ceylon tea by perchs claiming it didn’t taste of anything. Well, it didn’t, it only taste like tea without any notes of anything else. Well, this tea is not flavoured (alike ceylon) but it’s a oolong. It taste like a black tea, but unlike ceylon it has a distictive note of something else. It’s sweet and sour like coffee? I don’t know if you tasted LU Bastogne, but it’s like that, only its salty/sour instead.

Never tried oversteeping this one. Love it <3

Not exactly the one I have, I have Darjeeling FTGPOPI Diwali and I love this tea.

Peppermint tea with a bit of a kick in the form of additional fragrant herbs such as tarragon. May be overwhelmed by most kinds of food, so probably best consumed on its own, but works well for late nights when caffeine is out and a little mood boost would be more than welcome.

Organic and fair trade certified. Loose leaf. Smells lovely from the tin, smells lovely after steeped. Goes down smooth with a perfect rooibos flavour, and a hint of apricot. Love this one. I believe it’s limited edition, so if you want to try it, get it now.

I really enjoy this tea, and it seems more innately sweet than most peppermint teas. It actually reminds me more of a candy cane than straight peppermint, so the art on the box is really appropriate. It’s great nonetheless, especially with milk or cream.

Parting is such sweet sorrow. I’m using the last of my stash and it’s been discontinued. BIG BUMMER. I am going to see how many steeps I can get out of it…

I didn’t have this with Thanksgiving Dinner because we were drinking wine [Cakebread, super super good stuff], but I did have it beforehand. It’s probably a good thing because I was 9 months pregnant with a food baby afterwards and there’s no way I could have drank something that had that much flavor in it.

If there’s something I can give to Harney and Sons, it’s that when they do a flavored tea, it TASTES like what it’s supposed to be. I’ve become so accustomed to the good ol’ hibiscus stand-in when it comes to any fruit-type flavor that has a tartness to it that I was really surprised when I drank this the first time and it still continues to impress. I mean, stunt doubles are fine every now and then – utilized well and they can make a scene better – but I’m not paying to see the stunt double, I’m paying to see the actor.

So, cranberries. Check. And the orange that this is supposed to contain came out more this time round, though that’s probably because the last time I was really concentrating on this tea I was sick and couldn’t taste much. It’s not light, citrusy orange, it’s more like that flavor used in heavy liqueurs. From the rind, and dark.

The black tea is definitely present, though I can’t tell what kind of black tea it is. Upon revisiting the product description, it said that it’s a mix of Indian and Chinese black tea. That makes me feel slightly better about not being able to identify it.

I do enjoy this tea, but sometimes straight cranberry is just a little too tart for me and I need at least a hint of sweetness to fully enjoy it. The next time I drink this I’ll probably try it with sugar or honey.

I hope all of you had super, fantastic, fabulous Thanksgivings, or in some cases, super, fantastic, fabulous days. Either way, hugs to everyone!

Too much food. I needed tea but felt too full to have anything with caffeine (it makes sense in my head – work with me). I had some of this thanks to takgoti and thought this sounded fun and pretty interesting for tonight. I’ve never head buckwheat tea, so this should be an experience. Whee!

Brewing, it smells like puffed wheat cereal. Sugar Puffs or something but without the sugar. After pouring, the tea keeps the smell of a puffed wheat cereal but the buckwheat bits in the pot smell a bit liked burned popcorn.

This brews up insanely light colored. Pretty much like when you get hot water out of a pipe that hasn’t been used in a while – the water from the spout seems clear but when it pools in the sink it has a bit of a brown tint. That’s what this tea looks like. But the smell is strong so I don’t think the light color of the liquor indicates faint flavor.

Oh wow. This tastes sweet which is totally surprising because I can’t smell any sweetness, just puffed wheat. The sweetness that comes across in the taste makes it actually taste like Sugar Puffs… or maybe the milk after you eat the cereal (but without the creamy milk texture).

Made hubby try some because, ultimately, he is my guinea pig. He said it reminded him a bit of popcorn and that he liked it because it was unique. He gave it 4 out of 5 stars.

I’m with him in that I don’t think this is something that I could have every day because it is very unique and different. But, I think it would be something I’d like to have on hand all the time just in case. Because this would totally fill any cereal snacking desire I had. Frankly, I find this tea fascinating. Weird but wonderful. Sadly, Maeda-en is out of stock (I just checked).

This is the tea that got me into tea. I tried this on a whim at a Barnes and Noble cafe several years ago, and I’ve loved it ever since. It is naturally somewhat sweet, has a fresh but not overpowering minty flavor, and soft, harmonious undertones of its other ingredients, notably eleuthero and licorice. This is my staple tea—the one I have taken to carrying a miniature tin of wherever I go. I gave some to a friend at work and she said it was the best tea she’d ever tasted. It’s great!

Very, very refreshing! Perfect as a digestif. The flavours mix well, and this tea is like nothing else I’ve tried. Nice for those who don’t mind flavoured tea. Thinking this might make an awesome iced tea too.

This is as basic as a tea gets. Rooibos is technically a tisane or more commonly a herbal tea. It comes from a plant called Aspalathus linearis and simply referred to as red bush. The plant starts out as green and the “red” color emerges as a result of the oxidation that occurs during the processing of the leaves.

Rooibos has no caffeine as well as other chemicals that occur in tea (sourced from Camillia sinensis); these differences result in rooibos being very forgiving in the brewing process. You could easily oversteep leaves from Camillia sinenses and the resulting liquor is bitter, harsh and undrinkable, but oversteeping leaves from Aspalathus linearis does fall into that problem.

As a experiment, this rooibos was steeped for 8 minutes, with water that was boiling at the start. The tea that resulted tasted fine, it was strong on the typical smoky flavor but there was no bitterness.

Under a standard brewing of 2 minutes 30 seconds, it resulted in a refreshing tea that had a hint of smokiness to it and generally a smooth finish. There is a very, very slight nutty flavor to it that complements the mild plant-like taste- however, these two flavors are very mild, which is good for something like this that makes an excellent everyday drinker.