The first thing you notice is….there are sprinkles in my tea leaves!! I do not care how bad of a mood you are in, if you see sprinkles it is a smile inducer. Unless those sprinkles are casually replacing sesame seeds on your hamburger’s bun, then that might be annoying. The description of the tea’s ingredients list a blend of Vanilla, Cream, and Caramel teas, have tried two of those three and really enjoyed them I was excited. These teas use a base of Ceylon and blend with natural flavorings and usually I really like their blends, sadly there have been one or two that did not make me go WOW! but most of them are delicious.
The aroma of the dry leaves is strong, it doesn’t really smell like birthday. With a lot of Adagio’s flavored teas, you really cannot judge them from the leaf aroma (which I do find really frustrating) because it is usually really strong. This tea smells like you open up a bottle of vanilla extract and snort it. I do not smell any of the caramel or cream…or sprinkles, but they don’t really have a smell.
The aroma of the brewed tea though is YUM!! It smells so much like a freshly baked, butter-cream frosted, cupcake that I legitimately wondered ‘is this tea a portal to an alternate reality cupcake?’ I really think in a blindfolded test I would have thought that this tea was a cupcake. Which, I want to point out, is really convenient since I have been hard core craving some cake lately.
The taste reminded me of a tea soaked cake. The flavors are predominantly cream and vanilla with notes of caramelized sugar (not actual caramel candy, which is good since I am not a huge fan) as the initial sweetness fades you get to taste the base tea which is rich and mellow, no bitterness like you get with lower quality Ceylon. Everything about this tea is sweet, it is a dessert tea through and through. I recommend a splash of cream and no sugar unless you really need a sugar fix. Definitely best for after a meal when you don’t want to eat any more but want something sweet or for breakfast.
