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I decided to try this as a latte after the recent success of my Malt Shop latte, but sadly neither the coffee nor the chocolate is very prominent, and those are the notes which would make this a great latte. The strawberry is definitely the most prominent note, alongside the malty base, but there is a chocolate note I get towards the end of the sip. The espresso is nowhere to be found in latte form. I resteeped the leaf and it held up well, making a strong cup of malty black tea which actually had the coffee note more prominently than the first steep did. Bumping up the rating a little from 60 because while it wasn’t mindblowing, I did enjoy it more both as a latte and in the resteep than I previously have.

So, I was planning on having a black tea, but had just finished a (delicious) bowl of homemade apple crumble and custard, and thought this would be a good tea to follow it up with. Admittedly, I was confusing it with the Fu Shou Shan at first, and picturing those lovely natural apple and cinnamon notes which it has, but this was still a good choice, although accidental!

I also made an error in steeping judgement though, and used water that was not nearly hot enough for the first steep, which basically became a rinse. The tea didn’t open up at all, despite being steeped for 4 minutes, which was when I realised my error. I quickly heated the liquor and put the tea back in to steep for another couple of minutes, which did help, though it didn’t bring out the best in the tea. This cup was mildly nutty, with a scent of roasted almonds and asparagus and hints of creamy macadamia, vegetal notes and a toasted quality in the sip. Due to the steeping disaster I couldn’t really pinpoint too many of the complex notes I typically get from this one.

In I went again for a third steep of the leaf, hotter this time. This cup is more reminiscent of buttered sweetcorn…. I got sidetracked and stopped half way through my note, and drank the rest of the tea while doing other stuff, so I guess that’s all you’re getting for that particular steep! Oh well. On the plus side, I do now have my trip to London in January all booked up! There are some train strikes and engineering works going on, so we’ve had trouble getting the travel booked, but it’s all sorted now and for a very good price so I’m happy, even if it will take 2 hours longer than usual and involve a replacement bus service!

Lo and behold, another winner from the advent calendar! Two in one day, how thrilling! Despite the name, this isn’t particularly minty. It’s billed as a ‘green tea with cinnamon, peppermint and liquorice’, but weirdly I taste melon?? The cinnamon is, big surprise, almost non-existent, but the liquorice comes through towards the back end of the sip, and it’s a liquorice root sort of liquorice, not black liquorice. While I’m happy about that because I’m not a black liquorice fan, it does get a little too sweet as the cup cools. Nevertheless, I’m pretty happy with this one!

I don’t know why I only gave this a measly 69 last time I rated it, because this is soooo goooood! So good, in fact, that I took a different tea downstairs to brew up, and came back up with a resteep of this instead. It smells incredible, sweet chocolate wafting out of the bag and filling the room when it brews. I drank it as a latte earlier, brewed double strength with 1/3 hot milk and a splash of maple syrup added. I’ve had it in latte form before, but forgot how good it was. When I took my first sip my eyes grew wide and I actually giggled for a good 10 seconds before taking my second sip. It pains me that I will run out of this soon, because if it were still available it’s one I’d definitely keep around. It really does taste like a Malteser, which is one of my favourite chocolates. I’m not a fan of chocolate teas as a rule, but this is the exception! Maybe it’s the malt, which is in perfect balance with the chocolate. Whatever it is, it’s delicious, and just as good on the resteep, which I drank black with brown sugar. I can’t stop smelling my empty cup, which still smells strongly of chocolate, or cocoa butter. Yeah, I’m going to be bumping this rating up massively!

When I typed the name of this tea into the Steepster search bar, only one tea came up – something called ‘Lemongrass Peppermint Tropical Punch’ by the same company. Like many of these advent calendar blends, I suspect that they’ve renamed it for this ‘organic’ version and that it’s essentially the same tea, particularly as peppermint features heavily in the ingredients list of this blend.

This is a very average tea, but because my expectations were so low after the other teas in the calendar, I was pleasantly surprised by this one. It’s essentially a fruity lemongrass tisane, though since the only fruit in here is apple (which is definitely recognisable as apple and can’t pass as something more exotic) it is beyond me why they decided to label it ‘tropical’, making me expect something like mango or papaya. Maybe it’s the addition of hibiscus which inspired the name, but all this really does is add a characteristic metallic hint to the end of the sip so I almost wish it wasn’t included. Despite being high on the ingredients list – 2nd after lemongrass – peppermint is barely discernable until the end of the sip, and it’s definitely more earthy than minty here. Chamomile is also listed in the ingredients, but isn’t noticeable at all. As it cools, the hibiscus becomes more noticeable, so it’s definitely best drank hot if you’re not a hibby fan.

Overall, I wouldn’t buy this, but it’s better than most of the advent calendar teas have been, and fine as an accompaniment for the Cajun chicken flatbread I’m having for lunch.

I preferred this with the old Bluebird base, as the new Bird & Blend one is a little bit astringent and drying after a while, while the old one was really mellow and suited this tea… to a t? I might experiment with lowering the steeping time or temperature to see if I can do anything about that. Never mind though, it’s still delicious and a favourite I will stock up on in February (although probably the year after next, my cupboard is still ridiculous). I just read up on my old notes on this and it made me chuckle – I was incredulous that I had 3 year old tea in my stash. If only the me back then knew…

I’m ready to scream, why is everything in this advent calendar so samey?! Generic, astringent green tea base, with the same blend of chai-style ‘holiday’ spices as all of the others, and again I can’t taste any of them. I’m drinking this at the same time as an iced black coffee, and the coffee is genuinely more enjoyable. It certainly has more flavour.

It seems they’re just swapping one or two of the spices around without much thought and calling it a day for the majority of these teas. I’ve just counted from the ingredients breakdown on the back, and 7 of them sound extremely similar, which is not good considering they’re doubled up and there are only 13 ‘unique’ teas in the whole calendar, so that accounts for half of them! I don’t think I’ve tried them all yet, but so far there have only been one or two I’ve truly enjoyed, while the majority have been just this average blend of disappointing nothingness.

This rant is aimed more at the calendar than the tea itself, which is just the latest of these blurring together of samey teas, but it is probably the worst one yet. Maybe I’ll be in a better mood when I drink the second bag of this and able to give it a more constructive review, but for now I’ll just say that at least the box is pretty.

I’ve just remembered the garlic tea. Never mind, it’s the second worst.

I drank this last night, and was much more impressed than I expected to be, given that this was never my favourite originally. It still tastes just the same as it did, though, which is extremely impressive given the age of my Butiki teas! My heart wants to hoard them forever so I never run out, but my brain knows that I’m just letting them sit around losing flavour. I’m trying to be better about using them up, because what’s the point in having something you never use?
Most of my Butiki teas I only kept one or two cups worth, but this one is nearly a whole bag, which should let you know how I felt about it in comparison. I had low expectations going into this because of the age and also my previous impressions, but that being said, I really enjoyed it! It was rich and creamy more than buttery, and while this still isn’t my favourite flavour profile, it was a nice sipper while working on my essay. It’s definitely not Irish cream, and I think that’s my biggest gripe with this tea. If it were called something else – buttercream, for example – I think my expectations would have been adjusted going into it and I would have enjoyed it a lot more the first time around. Bumping my rating from 60 because I really did enjoy it.

This is not the bold hit of flavour I was expecting based on the gorgeous thick caramel scent coming off the dry leaf. It’s a mild, tannin-heavy, raisin-y black with the barest whisper of coffee, and a hint of caramel which becomes more prominent after adding milk and sugar. I’m a little disappointed, but probably had unfair expectations because of how much I enjoy actual caramel lattes. Plus, this came to me a good while ago courtesy of MissB so as always with my current tasting notes take it with a pinch of salt. I read through the other tasting notes on this tea, though, and it seems like even fresh it was lacking in the flavour department. Oh, well. Can’t win them all.

I don’t know what I did differently, but this is much nicer than the cup I had a couple of days ago! Maybe I used cooler water this time (I have to eyeball it since my temperature-variable kettle is packed away in the garage), but the green tea is less astringent, and the fruitiness comes through a lot more. I still wouldn’t say it tastes like pomegranate, more like blackcurrant, but it’s actually quite prominent and makes for an enjoyable cup. Still no sign of the spices anywhere, I have no idea why they bothered to add so many. Bumping my rating up from 52 because I’m actually quite enjoying it this time!