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So this one one of the free samples I got when the company was offering them. I’m just getting to them now, but at least I’m getting to them. Lol.

The leaves are beautiful. Twisty with silvery fuzz on them, but easy to measure out with a normal tsp.
Honestly, if I were to go by smell alone I’d have dumped this tea without trying it. The smell was very musky and reminded me of the smell that hits me when I go into the Australia house at the Zoo. Bleh. Thankfully I don’t get that same taste when I drink it. It’s kinda fruity, with just a hint of musk (though more woodsy musk and not animal musk). It’s pretty astringent to me, especially as it cools.

Glad I gave this a try, but as with many other darjeelings I’ve tried, this one isn’t my cup of tea.

Tea #12 from Another Traveling Tea Box

So I’m not sure if I did something wrong or it was something else. I don’t think it was me because I followed the instructions on the package. Though maybe I over leafed it since I drink 8oz and the instructions were for 6oz.
Anyway, this smelled good in the bag, and even the wet leaf had a vaguely fruity smell to it. But the execution pretty much fell on it’s face. It was very bitter for me (and my Mom who was over having dinner). Even after adding sugar it was undrinkable. I’m debating on if I want to try again with less leaf and shorter time since I think 4 min is much too long to brew black tea. At least, for me it is.
I’m holding off rating this until I try again, or I’ll just leave it unrated because I’m not sure I want to try again. Lol.

Tea #11 from Another Traveling Tea Box

So despite the rather unhappy reviews people seem to post for this, I still had to try this one. It just smelled so good. Lol.

Brewed this up and then eyed the rather pink brew in my cup dubiously. But I made it I might as well try it. It smells pretty fruity with a hint of green-ness to it. The first sip is kinda watery/weak and pretty unpleasant actually. It’s kinda tart and has this weird herb-y sort of taste. It’s not a green tea sort of taste, or at least not one I know of. I wish I actually knew what was in this aside from the types of tea and the fruit bits. Then again, I guess it doesn’t matter since I ended up pouring this one out. Even after adding some sugar is didn’t help one bit. Lol.
So this one is a no, despite how tasty it smelled.

Tea #9 from Another Traveling Tea Box

I’ve had this box for nearly a week and I haven’t gotten though everything I wanted to try yet. So I figure I’d better get my butt in gear and start trying some stuff. Lol. This is the 2nd tea I’m hoping to get through tonight, though I started later than I wanted, so we’ll just have to see.

This one smelled very fruity in the bag, though it did have a vaguely plastic-y sort of edge to it. But mostly I just smelled fruitiness.

Brewed I get plenty of fruit and it’s actually a pretty tasty tea. Straight it tastes like unsweet fruit juice. The fruit comes out so much better after adding a bit of truvia to it. Though it’s still strangely weak/watery tasting to me. Maybe that’s because I’m used to drinking black/oolong tea that have a bit more body to them. Next time I might try brewing this a bit longer, or possibly upping the temp a bit higher just to see what happens.
Watery-ness aside, this is one green tea that I wouldn’t mind actually ordering in the future.

Tea #8 from Another Traveling Tea Box

After the failure I had with the last tea, I figure a tea with cinnamon in it will at least reassure me that my taste buds aren’t dying on me. Lol.
I get cinnamon and something fruity/figgy. The sip is very full and I get a nice figgy-ness from it. The cinnamon thankfully isn’t as in-your-face as I was fearing with as many cinnamon chips as was in the scoop. It’s a decent enough tea and I’m glad I was able to sample it, especially considering it’s not really one I would’ve ordered myself. But I still wouldn’t consider ordering it now.

Tea #7 from Another Traveling Tea Box

So I wanted to give a straight tea a shot and grabbed this one because the name was interesting. Didn’t smell like much, but being in the sort of packaging it was, I didn’t expect to smell much other the rest of the box’s scents.

Brewed I was getting a thick malty smell with green beans(?) which was strange. I didn’t get any green bean taste, but it was rather mulch-y/bark tasting to me. Bleh.

Tea #6 from Another Traveling Tea Box

This one I was trying purely on the name since I didn’t get much of any sort of smell from the bag that I’d associate with the named tea. Mostly I was getting scents from other teas from the box, so I hope this didn’t get contaminated.

Brewed this had a cinnamon-y smell with a vaguely cookie/bakey kinda hint tossed in there? It was kinda hard to tell scent wise even though I practically inhaled the tea through my nose. (please note I don’t recommend doing this. Lol!)

Taste wise I get cinnamon and something kinda almond/nutty but it doesn’t really taste like much else sadly. I kinda get a decent black tea under everything else. But for me it was pretty unremarkable and blah. Maybe trying with 2 tsp or 2 1/2tsp might give it more ‘oomph’, but I’ll leave that for someone else to try.

Tea #5 from Another Traveling Tea Box

First smelling this I was reminded strongly of the caramel apple pops that you can get usually around Halloween (though I wasn’t able to find any this year /sad/) and I was pretty excited to give this a try.

Brewed I was still getting caramel more than any sort of chocolate smell though, with a vague apple-y hint. Unfortunately the taste doesn’t match the scent. I found it to be rather sour with a strange odd taste that I couldn’t really identify, but that was definitely unpleasant. And it was kinda watery tasting aside from that, even after adding some sugar hoping that it’d bring out the flavors it’s supposed to have.

I’d say that I maybe should try 2 tsp next time, but unfortunately I don’t really have any sort of desire to give this another shot. I might consider grab it in a try-me pack and see if it was just the batch here, but probly not. Maybe I did something wrong since it seems I’m the only one who had an undesirable experience with this tea. I don’t think so, but /shrug/.

Tea #4 from Another Traveling Tea Box

Dry this smells kinda like that astronaut strawberry ice cream I remember having once. Vaguely almost stale, but with a definite creamy strawberry scent.
The brew has the same creamy strawberry smell and the first straight taste is definitely strawberry, though I’m not so much getting any ice cream/sundae feel. After I added some truvia, the sweetness brought out that sundae taste and feel, just in a hot liquid form which was a bit strange. Reminded me of my experience with DavidsTea Cookie Dough – it tastes like it’s named for, but the execution is hard for my brain to wrap around.

I might be tempted to get this in the next try-me sampler I get from Della Terra just so I have some on hand when I want something creamy and strawberry tasting. But it’s not one I’d have around for a staple in my cupboard.

Tea #10 from Another Traveling Tea Box
Yes, I’m missing a few numbers because I’ve tried some other teas from the box before this one, but I haven’t gotten around to putting reviews up here. I have them all written down in my notebook, so I’ll be putting them in after this one. I just wanted to write this review while I’m drinking it.

So this one smelled nice in the bag, and while I have my reservations about anything with green tea in it, I figured what the heck.
The ratios were a bit loose so I tried 1 1/2 tsp @185* for 2 min. I think I should’ve tried 2 tsp because this came out a bit watery tasting for me. But it was still a nice cup. I didn’t get an overpowering green ‘veggie’ type taste from the green tea, though I’m not sure if that’s the oolong tempering it or I’m just starting to get more used to the overall taste. I get a vague fruity tartness that, after I added a bit of truvia, pretty much went away and left just a fruityness behind. I didn’t get any sort of vanilla that apparently should be here after reading the description that’s up for this tea.
It was still nice, just probly not something I’d order myself because currant just isn’t really something I care for taste wise. But this was definitely not one of the ‘pour it out after one sip’ sort of green teas that I’ve had in the past.