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Yummy! This flavoring is subtle and fairly natural tasting… this is like earl grey with a touch of red twizzlers. I enjoyed it, even more with a touch of vanilla almond milk! The resteep lost a bit of flavor, which is why I didn’t rate this a little higher. But I really enjoyed this, especially for a flavored tea.

To be fair… the rating/ review is for the over all tea not for its taste alone. I seem to be catching bronchitis again :( so am taking this opportunity to review a lot of herbals.

This is a medicinal tea, that rishi has made very approachable by making it taste like a bright lemony ginger tea rather than medicine. It’s very effective at doing what you want it to do (make your throat/ stomach feel better/ be warm and comforting) while tasting vastly better than most herbals that do the same. That being said, I am on team ginger rather than team peppermint 90% of the time.

The complex citrus notes (lemon grass, orange and lemon I know from the label are in there) really liven it up. It’s pleasant enough to drink even when your not sick, I drink it a lot after I work out for the anti-inflammatory properties of tumeric to try and not get sore the next day.

I take daily tumeric/greens supplements, so I know exactly how nasty this COULD taste (everyone I know gags at the smell and is HOW CAN YOU DRINK THAT?). An believe this is my favorite way to take turmeric. Ginger is always best fresh in chai or stir fry though! But it’s better than Yogi’s lemon ginger I reach for when I am so sick all I want is to shove hot water down my throat.

Taste alone I would rate this in the 70s. But its easily and B when the artistry and effectiveness of the ingredients is considered. If you ever find a tumeric tea thats an A in taste, please send me a gallon of it!

Taste: 75
Effectiveness: 90
Price/Value: 80ish

Of course this isn’t great shou… I’d be really sad for someone to waste good shou in a blend like this, but you know what? It’s cheap CHOCOLATEY shou so I am still happy… it is also not vanilla mint… so if you go in expecting anything from the name of this tea you will be a sad panda.

Now let’s talk about what this tea is… with a little bit of vanilla almond milk at the end this tea is chocolate fennel more than anything… its desserty and a treat before bed that won’t keep you up all night.

Rishi has new green tins that were too cute not to pick up from Wegmans.

You want a cheap cuppa chocolate that has a decent resteep value for something so cheap? Try some of this. If you want something to curb a hot chocolate craving, get some of this. If you want to try a weird blend that smells good… get some of this. If you are like me and tend to forget your teas brewing because you are used to gongfu and want something forgiving for a cheap thrill, this might be your thing.

If you are going in expecting this to be vanilla mint… go try some Tippy’s Minted Monkey instead. If you are going into this hoping for some good ripe puerh, hit up Crimson Lotus or one of the many other pu erh vendors on Steepster.

But just know, as I was drinking this I would not have guessed it was so lowly rated on steepster… I would never have bought it if I had looked first, but I am very glad I did.

What comes to mind drinking this tea is: “How about a big Goron HUG?!” It’s earthy and soothing all at once.

Taste wise it isn’t anything to knock you off your seat… but the soothing earthy minerals hug all your insides.

Dry the leaf has a very sweet floral aroma, but as soon as you warm it up you know you’re smelling a relative of Manzhuan. That rich vanilla depth. But here it is paired with some subtle floral notes and something akin to nectarine or apricot skin that becomes more pronounced as the infusions go on. A stellar tea if you are a fan of Tea Urchins 2014 Manzhuan or W2T’s 2015 Poundcake. This is their more complex sister.

I’ve only brewed this one up once (and only have enough for one or two more sessions) but to me this seemed a little less tricky to get right than those two. I only had to minorly adjust my default brewing method on the second steep to bring out the complexity of this pot. I’d say this is something someone new to puerh could enjoy as well as people who are more seasoned. It’s not mind blowingly complex, but it is complex enough to make you take notice. It’s comforting but challenges you to taste a little more closely. It’s fresh but familiar all at once. Over all this is a good tea that I think could be enjoyed by many. It’s a blunter version of GFZ but I think could be loved by someone who wants GFZ but doesn’t want to pay more than twice as much for the cake.

I don’t know if this screams special occasion… but it definitely screams I am wearing my fancy PJ pants and want to treat myself to something extraordinary. It’s something you could serve to guests who love green or white teas… and you want to bring them to the puerh dark side.

Another high quality tea from Belle and Eugene.

Sorry for the utility tasting notes. I don’t think one tasting is enough to truly describe this tea, but I’m hoping that this is enough to guide people who will enjoy this tea to sample it and improve upon my tasting note.

In short: yumm this is all peaches and vanilla and green tea!

I LOVE this tea. It’s the dancong of yanchas… which is like two really good things that don’t sound like they’d be great together… but they are. This tea is aromatic during it’s whole life span, but unlike most yanchas I don’t really start enjoying until later steeps cough cough roasty I love this one from the first glass. In fact the first few steeps are my favorite, but I am a fan of the whole journey.

This combines the mineral and fruity flavors of a yancha with the honey floral aroma of a dancong. I never knew yancha could be so overtly aromatic. I’ve honestly never tasted anything quite like this tea.

It’s giving me the yearning for EXCELLENT dancong though… hey maybe now that white 2 tea is based in Guangzhou… here is to hoping for a dancong of this callibre in a club shipment soon.

But yes folks… I’ve never tasted a tea like this before. Get your hands on some! It is really universally appealing and easy to love and would be a great tea to serve to family members and friends to get them coveting some less traditionally served teas in the west.

I haven’t had this tea in a few hours (haha yay tea drunk at home days) so might have to add in some more in depth tasting notes later. But for the 3 times I’ve had this tea so far… I haven’t had a session that wasn’t STELLAR and full of happy tea drunk Phi.

I hope this becomes a yearly offering at white 2 tea! Because I’m sure this stash isn’t going to hold up for long.

This is a tea you start to drink, and after a few glasses you end up doing a double take… What is this fantastic aroma at the back of my throat? Next cup… wow it’s coming from the tea. This tea is a late bloomer. The girl in all the chick flix that the guys don’t notice until her makeover montage.

While the first few steeps didn’t really taste like much, much less special enough to be a cake this expensive… I was shortly blown away. First by the after taste… and soon after the flavor. This tea must have had impeccable storage to maintain it’s leaf character and not just taste like generic aged sheng. This one truely differentiates itself.

What this reminds me of is Tea Urchin’s 2014 Xi Kong, but all grown up. It has that same knock your socks off meadow and honey aroma as that fresh sheng, but more intense and backed by lower bass notes. This has all the wonders of young and middle age sheng at once! And goes forever and ever…

The later steeps are sugared plums. Yumm. This tea just keeps evolving.

This tea has not acquired it’s reputation unduly… but at the same time it is still rather young for people who are into aged tea. This tea is a cougar, she might be 40 but she looks (and dates) in her 20s. It is not too aromatic or gawdy, but after a quick warm bath is gorgeous and perfumed. I can’t stop smelling the gaiwan. It’s like being transported to one of those hill sides covered in flowers from musicals. You can smell the beeswax and flowers, backed by something a little more bitter. I keep humming Brigadoon… and am taken to that land we depicted in a musical in high school.

This tea is magic. If you don’t watch out you’ll end up in a land far away from where you sit right now. A tingling at the back of my throat beckons me to sing, my whole body is buzzing from where this tea is transporting me.

I think this is my favorite young sheng at the moment. It’s so fruity and sweet and complex! Great after taste. How much leaf you use drastically alters the flavor profile in my experience. With less leaf it is refreshing and shares a similar flavor profile to some of the high mountain teas (like Mandala’s Wild Mountain Green). With more leaf its more like a Jingmai, but with less hay and smoke.

I think I might like this the best of W2T’s 2015 releases (but I haven’t tried 72 hours yet). The variety is good… but this is by far the best value tea as TwoDog states. It’s very easy to enjoy. While this might not be as strong of a body feel or after taste as some of the more expensive ones, as far as straight up flavors are concerned IYARTI2L takes the cake. Especially with a heavier leafing.

Nom nom nom this is delicious and complex and wonderful. It has that slightly aquatic dirty note I love in aged Sheng, followed by a foresty wonderfulness. There is a camphor note that lingers, and almost a berry taste. I’m a fan and so glad it’s back in stock at the moment so I can pick up a cake with my Clover Patch! I wish I had found this when it was $15 a cake, but even at $29 its really tasty within that price point. Not to mention the cute label.