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Thank you TeaEqualsBliss for sending me some of this tea.

First of all, the packaging is pretty cool! It is all stacked neatly into a box which is then tied with twine and sealed with a wax seal. Pretty snazzy! Inside the box, there are four tins: One large tin that holds the blended tea, and three small tins that hold the components of the tea – white peony, dried strawberries, and cacao nibs. I like this, not just because one can customize their cup of tea the way they want it, but also because you can easily judge the quality of each component (I like that I will be able to brew a separate cup of white peony so that I can judge it without the strawberry and cacao nib)

But it also causes me to wonder … is this blended with JUST the dried strawberry or with strawberry flavor also? If it’s jut the dried strawberry, I’m in for a pretty dismal strawberry experience, I fear. I guess I will have to wait until the tasting …

Yep, it is as I feared… the strawberry notes are very faint. VERY faint. If you were to order this “flavor” with thoughts of chocolate strawberries dancing in your head, you would be sorely disappointed. This is white tea. First and foremost. It’s a fine white tea though. It is sweet with honey-esque tones and a fresh vegetal tone. A very nice white peony: flavorful yet delicate.

The strawberry flavor is there. But it is very subdued, and noticeable primarily toward the finish and in the aftertaste where I note a taste much like I’d experience if I had just eaten a fresh berry. The aftertaste is very similar to that. During the sip though, the strawberry is not there.

The chocolate is even more pale in flavor than the strawberry. However, it IS noticeable in the sip, around mid-sip, I notice a delicious chocolate-y note that washes over the palate. It’s wonderfully delicious, even if it is a bit on the softer side. And when it comes to chocolate, more is better.

I think for my next pot of this tea, I shall add a few more of the cacao nibs and perhaps a little more strawberry to bring these flavors out. And before that, I intend to try some of the white peony on its own to see how that experience differs from this one. For now, though, I think I shall hold off on the rating, because, while it is enjoyable for what it is… it isn’t what I think I wanted it to be, so I find myself a little disappointed because of that.