When I first opened the bag, the dry tea smelled very strongly of freshly cooked, just off the stove caramel, which was a shock – usually, in chocolate containing teas, the hot cocoa smell overpowers everything, and I was hopeful that this would be more of a caramel taste with an undertone of chocolate.
After brewing, the chocolate really came out – the tea and spent leaves both smelled of melted chocolate pieces, with little caramel or salt to be found! Luckily, the chocolate and caramel balance much better in the cup. This is a pretty good dessert tea – probably not worth the original asking price, but at less than $1/oz, with each oz probably giving me over a half gallon of tea, I can’t complain.
I also can’t speak to the salt in this blend. I don’t taste it, but I’m a salt hound and probably wouldn’t taste it unless it was so salty it made normal folks cough.