Nurvilya Send Message

Well, I’m glad I just bought a teeny amount of this in store and didn’t get overexcited and buy a whole bag online.

I want to like this tea! I should like this tea! I like floral tea! I like roses, licorice, coconut, and chili! On paper, everything seems perfect.

The dry leaves definitely smell of roses. I don’t detect any coconut in my nose, and I can’t see any either. There’s also an acidic smell that reminds me of vinegar. I disregard this and continue on.

Brewed, the vinegar smell gets stronger, and I start to feel wary. I still smell rose, and maybe some licorice, but everything is sort of blanketed by that smell.

The flavour is definitely floral, there’s a lot of rose, and some sweetness from the fennel, but I still can’t find coconut, and I don’t feel any heat from the chili. But most of all, I taste sour. Not tartness, in your usual rosehip way, but sour. Vinegary. Not very nice.

I don’t know that this would be everyone’s experience. Maybe I had a bad sample. Maybe others will find a way to brew this that totally rocks my world. But for now, I will be letting this pass.

Man, I’ve had a lot of tea today!

And I think I’ve found a winner from the bunch in this fiery sweet tea.

I love licorice, and licorice things. Fennel, anise, stevia (which I find a bit licoricey, do you?), I love it all. And this tea is just that, fennel seeds steeped with some tiny, wicked hot chilis.

This is the kind of kick I love! The tea is sweet from the fennel, but warms my throat with capsaicin heat. I got two little peppers in my infuser, so I figure my heat level was pretty high in this cup, and I definitely wouldn’t want it to go much higher, lest the heat turn to fire. I also wouldn’t steep it much longer than the 5 mins I did this time. But this is interesting and exciting enough that I can definitely see myself drinking a cup of this in the afternoon for a kick, or maybe even after a workout.

I guess this makes me a happy kapha, hey?

I’m trying to blaze through tasting the bits of all of the new Davids teas today, so I can place an order online for Santa’s Secret before it’s sold out. I may already be too late!

So, given that fact, I’m trying this one right after trying Splash! for the first time, and I may be over-gingering myself.

I like the smell of this one a lot – just like ginger beer. Spicy and sweet.

The flavour is actually a bit flat when compared to the smell. My first cup was just a 3-minute steep, so I put the leaves back into the pot to see what might happen. And still, it’s a bit flat for my taste. I want more punch! I also wish there was more of a green tea profile.

I’m giving this one a firm meh. I think that if I’m looking for a ginger hit, there are other teas I would turn to first.

Is it in poor taste to start a review with the words “not as bad as I thought it would be”?

Well poor taste be damned then. This truly wasn’t as bad as I was expecting! The other reviewers’ notes about nori and sushi made me want to cover my head and run for a pot of Genmaicha instead. But, since I was at Davids today anyway, and because I’m a sucker for a gimmick, I figured I’d get a small amount and try it.

And yeah, it’s pretty good! Lots of ginger, not so much mint, and only a slight oceanic note that I find quite intriguing. The green tea is delicate, and I totally agree that this blend would be delicious with sushi. It’s quite palate cleansing, and I think it would be nice with food.

I don’t know that I would find myself craving this regularly, but for an afternoon cuppa, it wasn’t so bad.

How’s that for non-committal?

“Like drinking a fresh forest breeze” says the description, and yes, that’s exactly how this feels.

I say feels, because this tea goes beyond taste. Maybe it’s the Canadian in me, but there is something very evocative about these flavours. Having just spent the weekend in the Rocky Mountains, snowshoeing around an icy glacial lake, I feel like I’m in the exact right mood to be drinking this minty, foresty brew.

I love how this looks in my glass teapot. It’s not particularly easy to measure, but I figured I’d just add some pinches and hope for the best. It’s hard to get a good mix of all the pretty things, given that some of the smaller bits tend to settle to the bottom of the bag, but I scrounged around for a bit of everything, and again, hoped for the best.

I see no hint of the pink tinge hinted at in the description, but the very clear, light brew is appealing nonetheless. The scent is like smelling a forest through a LifeSavers Wint-o-mint candy. I like it. And the flavour is very light. Less minty than I expected, but delicate and tingly. I like it.

It’s not for everyday. But it makes me feel Canadian and outdoorsy, and I like that.