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As some of you may have noticed by now, I am a huge fan of Della Terra’s cream flavoring. In fact, Della Terra has a regular vanilla cream rooibos that I rated quite highly. So how is it that this tea blend, which is basically the same thing with spooky sprinkles added, tastes completely blah to me? Before I knew what was in it, it just tasted like a competent but plain rooibos. Even knowing that this is a vanilla blend, I’m barely tasting it. A most peculiar situation…

Courtesy of my Secret Pumpkin, Short Sorceress. Thank you!

I added some sugar this time to see how it would affect the taste. I’m still picking up ginger and the flavor of those coffee crumbs on top of the coffeecake, but no actual cake flavor. This is still good, but not quite hitting the spot like it did last time. I think I may have underleafed this one. I used 1 teaspoon because I’m trying to stretch out my sample from Sil. I might add the rest of the leaf to the resteep and see if that helps.

Another subject in my ongoing experimental series, “guess what’s in this tea without looking at the description” (suggestions for a better title are welcome and encouraged). I believe that I got this from our Taste of France swap, but I don’t know who gave it to me. Thanks to whoever it was!

I picked this out for its lovely minty scent. The auto complete on my phone just suggested that I follow “minty” with “frosting”, which sounds delicious and now I want a chocolate cupcake with minty frosting. That would actually go pretty well with this tea, though vanilla would probably be even better.

Aaanyway, this has a clean spearmint smell. The first few sips are a great balance of spearmint and good quality green tea, with a hint of lemon. As I kept drinking, the (very natural) lemon flavor really came to the fore and stayed there. The spearmint kept playing around the edges and kept this from being a boring lemon tea. This tastes exactly like what it purports to be.

I generally dislike lemon teas because they either taste fake or like plain tea with some lemon juice squeezed in. If I want my tea with lemon, I’ll just make tea and add lemon in exactly the proportion I like. But this tea has a lemon taste that is simultaneously natural and less acidic than lemon juice. The added element of the mint really makes this stand out for me as an enjoyable cuppa.

I’m not generally one to squee over candies in my tea. I like flavored teas, but there’s something about having actual candy in there that just feels like a step too far. This tea is the exception though. The little multi-colored maple leaves are just charming. I love it.

The smell of this tea is very maple. The color is dead on for maple syrup. Early in the cup, I wasn’t impressed by the flavor. It tasted overwhelmingly of rooibos with only a faint hint of maple. As I kept drinking, a bit of syrupy film built up on the roof of my mouth (in a pleasant way) and the maple flavor drowned out the rooibos. This definitely hits the spot for something sweet! Quite enjoyable.

This is from my Secret Pumpkin swap. Thank you Short Sorceress!

This tea is ok, but in no way notable. It’s green and it’s minty and that’s about it. Pretty mediocre for me.

Thanks for the taste moraiwe. Sipdown!

Another tea I tried without checking the ingredients. I was drawn in by the orange sprinkles, but the brew is an off-puttingly dark green. I guess that’s supposed to tie in with the Halloween theme, but it just weirds me out. The taste is sort of generically fruity and a touch tangy. Not a huge fan. Thanks for the taste Short Sorceress!

Yay, first tea from my Secret Pumpkin – thanks Short Sorceress!

I decided to drink this not knowing what it was (and I’ll continue drinking it forever just because… I wanted to make the Lamb Chop reference). This tea smells delectably like chocolate. It brews up a weird combination of green and brown… like brown with a layer of green on top. The flavor is primarily rich, thick chocolate, reminiscent of ZenTea Rooibos Belgian Chocolate. There’s something else here too – mint maybe? The mint comes out much more in the aftertaste. I actually rather like this. Which is surprising because Butiki’s Peppermint Patty is very similar in concept and I did not enjoy that tea at all. Maybe it’s the creaminess of that tea that didn’t work for me? This one tastes more like mint chocolate than peppermint patty. Not something I would drink every day but definitely a solid dessert tea.

Sipdown!

I’m trying to drink teas without knowing what’s in them and see if I can pick out the flavors. This one seemed very floral and a touch creamy without overwhelming the base tea. Of course once I looked up the description and saw pineapple and coconut, it totally tasted like that instead. So yeah, that’s bias for ya. Either way, this is quite tasty. I don’t even like coconut teas, but the flavor is very subtle here. And there’s a nice tanginess too. Thanks to Laurent at Nina’s Teas for the sample.

Perfect. Wonderful pineapple flavor, light and natural. Sweet and a touch tart but not too much of either. Just yummy and elegant with a refreshing aftertaste. I’m pretty sure I can make a bunch of little cups of tea and create a Butiki fruit salad with the Cantaloupe & Cream, the Watermelon Xylophone, the Flowery Pineapple Oolong – maybe even the Ruby Pie!

Sad to say this is a sipdown. Thanks to Sil for letting me try it!

EDIT: This is also fantastic iced.

Sooo… my cat spilled most of this all over my computer. But what I got to drink before he did that was tasty and soothing. I still really like the lavender in this. Good as a bedtime tea.