1294 Tasting Notes
Day 21 of the Lupicia advent calendar. Five sachets of this one! Plus it’s an herbal, which means I’ll likely get through it pretty quickly. More than anything this makes me think of churchkhela. This makes no sense because there’s no grape or nuts in here! Maybe it’s the texture or the exact degree of sweetness? If I really focus my palate and actively tell it to ignore the association, I can tell that peach and mandarin orange are the two dominant notes in my cup. In this case, though, I don’t really want to do that! First of all because it’s pretty hard, and second because I’m enjoying it exactly as it is so why torture myself in order to get less pleasure from the cup in the interest of having a more accurate tasting experience while sitting around watching Star Trek?
Day 10 of 52teas advent calendar. I had this while working today so admittedly wasn’t able to give it my full attention. The tangerine/citrus seemed to pop more when it cooled. The base is a bit brisk and tannic, but in a way that serves to temper what I agree is best described as “marshmallow frosting” flavor. It’s got that fluffy marshmallow quality but also that particular sweetness and almost texture of frosting. It did mess with my stomach a little but not too badly (and not at all a reflection of the quality of the tea, it’s my own body’s sensitivity).
Day 9 of the 52teas advent calendar. Such a cozy fall/winter tea. I love this maple flavor. I find the pear soft and mellow. The base is great for this – sweet and slightly nutty. I can’t decide whether this would take oat milk well or the oat milk would drown out the flavors, but I don’t really feel like standing up to go get oat milk.
Day 22 of Plum Deluxe herbal advent calendar. Yup, this tastes like pomegranate and sugar! I get a kick out of there being a whole dehydrated cranberry in my sample. That’s probably not the best way to extract flavor but it is very visually pleasing (not to mention satisfying to watch it plump up). It’s good cold. I liked it even better when it was hot, though. Sort of a hot apple cider or hot toddy vibe, but with pomegranate as the base flavor.
Day 22 of the Tea Thoughts winter countdown box. A big chunk of today was spent browsing the mall for gifts because we’re very behind on holiday prep. Nothing seemed quite right so it took a while to find gifts we were happy with. We did find a Pokemon decked out for winter for our nephew, which is probably the most exciting thing we brought home. I had a couple Western-style mugs of this oolong before we left. I remember some minerality and roastiness but not much else. I’ll have to try this out with a gong fu brew.
Day 8 of the 52teas advent calendar. The raspberry and lemon in this are so clear. Just the right level of sweetness and the right kind of tartness. The base tea is brisk enough to complement the fruit but not so brisk as to overwhelm it. My only critique, and honestly it’s not much of a critique because it still tastes really good, is that I can taste the cotton candy and am not getting a cookie note. Maybe just rename it “raspberry lemon cotton candy”?
Day 7 of the 52teas advent calendar. So happy to see this one again! I liked it so much last year that I ordered extra afterwards. The banana and the creaminess just go so well together. I only did two steeps this time just because I had a lot of other tea to get through, but I remember this holding up pretty well to a third steep in the past.
