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Sipdown!

I figured I would go ahead and finish this one off. One fewer tea to worry about!

I’m getting a bit more char this evening, which I don’t love as it covers up the sweetness a little. This doesn’t have a ton of complexity to begin with, so losing that dried fruit note makes it even more blah.

Overall, this one was fine but just a bit flat and lacking in dimension.

Sipdown! It was a 5g packet, but still counts! After this, the only single packets I have left are all gyokuro, which I’m a bit hesitant to try until I’ve had a few more sencha. The dry leaf here had a lovely warm chestnut brown color. The pieces looked quite a bit smaller than the Tsubame hoji-kukicha, like they were made from slimmer stems.

I wasn’t feeling the kyusu tonight, so I did a sort of hybrid method. Still the same amount of leaf to water, but in a baby teacup with a wire basket instead of a traditional pot. My three steeps were 30s, 15s, and 45s. The steeped tea had a beautiful amber-chestnut color to it.

This actually has a mellower flavor than I expected given the color. Lovely soft wood and autumn leaf notes as usual, but it also has a mineral char that reminds me of a roasted oolong. I also taste more umami notes than I generally get in hojicha, and they’re similar to toasted seaweed. There’s an underlying richness that reminds me of dark caramel, but without the sweetness.

I feel like I’m describing all of these roasted tea the same way, hah… It would be interesting to do a side-by-side comparison to see how they really differ. Hopefully the notes aren’t terribly repetitive! >.<

So this is one of three teas in my cupboard for which I wasn’t able to ascertain a received date. For some reason, there’s no email for this in my archive, even though I know I ordered it, and I never made an account with The Tea Spot so I can’t figure it out that way either. So I decided to just move this and the other two teas to my sipdown box to get them over and done with, because their not having dates irritates me… XD

This is one of the few pumpkin spice teas that I actually like. And I think it’s because 1) it has pumpkin flavor, and 2) it’s not an explosion of clove. The spices are nicely balanced and not over-the-top. I will say, the base is an Assam as it’s somewhat brisk, and I always forget to try steeping it a bit less. But I’d definitely rather have a more flavorful base than the blandness that a lot of pumpkin spice teas have…

Next time, maybe I’ll try this as a latte! :D

The mini tin sipdowns continue!

I think age may have affected this one a bit, as I’m not really picking up on the matcha at all. Mostly it tastes like a mild and toasty cocoa powder. Which isn’t a bad thing, but would like more matcha flavor. It also doesn’t stand up that well to the milk without it.

The texture is also slightly gritty, which is unpleasant. And it’s kind of coating my teeth as well, and making my whole mouth feel gritty.

Not a huge fan, especially when it’s basically just a cocoa matcha, which they already offer, with charcoal added.

I was inspired to try this one, from an old subscription box, after seeing a note for a similar tea from Courtney.

So, this is not at all what I expected. Apparently it’s meant to be a replacement for a breakfast blend, but without caffeine. It’s a mixture of rooibos and honeybush with some kind of flavor. According to the description, the honey notes from just from the honeybush, so I don’t know what the flavoring is?

Anyway, this just tastes like rooibos and honeybush to me. Woody and slightly boozy caramel notes from the rooibos, and biscuity, slightly peppery notes from the honeybush. A tiny hint of honey perhaps? But I wouldn’t guess this is flavored.

It’s not bad, just a bit odd and underwhelming. Luckily I like the taste of honeybush, so it’s still drinkable for me.

From my December Sips by box.

Because this has a very mild and sweet dry scent, I was surprised by how roasted the wet leaves smelled. The steeped aroma is somewhere between the two, with a light-to-moderate roasty scent.

This is a mellow dark oolong, and a bit one-dimensional. There is a light roasty note, not nearly as strong as I would expect from the wet leaves. The main flavor is that of fallen autumn leaves and wood chips, moistened by a recent rainfall. I also taste a very subtle dried fruit-like sweetness and a hint of earthy and mineral charcoal.

It’s pleasant enough, but very one-note. Still, its slightly toasty flavor is quite comforting in the evening. :)

More Obubu fun today! Another of my lingering 5g packets from a sampler pack. This one had a lovely dry scent, very sweet and alfalfa-like. I did three steeps – 60s, 15s, and 45s.

Where the Spring Sun was energetic, this was a more mellow and calm sencha. It had a subtle grassy sweetness along with more vegetal notes of spinach and green peas. The vegetal flavor here was quite concentrated as well, though less so than Spring Sun, with plenty of rich umami character. This had a lovely texture as well – thick and silky smooth. There was almost no bitterness at all, which was quite a contrast with the previous sencha. A slightly shorter finish as well, with soft vegetal notes in place of florals.

It’s interesting how even though a lot of the notes are the same between the two teas, they had very different characters. I’m sure I’m not describing it well, but hopefully as I drink these teas more often, my palate will improve.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CJXSpNHgXN7/

(P.S. – Are my Instagram links working for other people? I get an error when I try to visit them…)

Sipdown!

Another leftover mini tin emptied! Lavender lime is such an interesting flavor combination… Prepared this hot with 5 ounces of water and 3 ounces of milk.

I wonder if this is called “Swampthing” because the spirulina sort of rises to the top and floats around in little swirls. Combined with the slight foam, it does look rather swampy. For some reason, the beginning of the sip reads very banana to me. I see that I mentioned the same thing in my first note, so it’s not the milk. Anyway! The lime pops up midway through the sip and is quite zippy with a bit of pith. The lavender is mostly just in the aftertaste for me, and it’s subtly lemony and floral.

This seems like a lightly-flavored one, I taste a lot of the matcha which is nice. If B&B’s matcha wasn’t so expensive, I would consider getting this one…

Sipdown!

This was just oddly bland and nondescript. It sort of tasted like a vague butter rum or chestnut flavor.

But mostly just rooibos. Meh.

This is another one that I opened to send in a swap. And after seeing VariaTEA mention a snickerdoodle blend, I had a craving!

This is pretty much liquid snickerdoodle! It has such a yummy buttery cinnamon flavor to it that could pass as cinnamon roll as well. The cinnamon is definitely the real thing as well, no candy flavor here. I can’t decide how I feel about the blackberry leaf though… I can see how a bit of sweetness is needed here, considering snickerdoodles are literally dipped in sugar. But the sweetness veers a bit artificial, similar to stevia. It’s not over-the-top thankfully.

It’s definitely snickerdoodle! Simpson & Vail has such good green rooibos blends… ❤