2036 Tasting Notes

77

My iced attempt was, unfortunately, not successful, but it wasn’t this blend’s fault. I only had enough for three cups instead of four, so my concentrate wasn’t strong enough. There was a root beer smell, and a weak rooibos taste but not much else. And it wasn’t a great day for iced tea on top of all that — cloudy, cold, dreary. Oh well, I hope someone else is able to get it to work nicely.

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79
drank White Peach by The Jade Teapot
2036 tasting notes

I now understand what people mean when they say that white tea takes up a lot of space. The five samples I got from the Jade Teapot are all in bags the same size, but this one is a white whereas the other three I’ve tried so far are greens. The samples are easily two cups worth for the green. For the white, I have about enough left after weighing this out for another half cup. The grandeur of white leaves is something to behold. In general I think they tend to be the prettiest dry leaves, though there are always exceptions; the curliness of oolongs, the various geometries of greens and even the classic look of plain black leaves can be quite becoming.

These are pretty — though in color they’re not all white. They range from silvery to brown to green, with some light brown which I suppose is the osthmanthus. The smell in the little sample bag is, interestingly, pretty similar to the smells of the others from Jade Teapot. Cough syrup. It must be something about how the aromatic oils used for flavoring interact with the plastic of the little bags.

The steeped tea smells peachy, sweet, and a little creamy. It’s not a full, deep smell, but I hesitate to call it light as that seems to connote weak. And that doesn’t seem appropriate as this tea is a water color, not an oil painting. At least that’s the difference that occurs to me between this, and, for example, the Blood Orange Pu Erh that I had earlier. This is painted with a much more translucent palette. There’s a very slight “planty” smell, a little floral, a little green. The color of the liquor is yellow, with a tinge of pinky peach. And it tastes pretty much exactly as it smells.

It must be my current mood. Perhaps I’m in need of comforting. But I’m finding oils more satisfying than water colors these days. I might order some of this, though. I can see it being a nice spring time tea.

Preparation
175 °F / 79 °C 5 min, 0 sec
Stephanie

Wonderful imagery! “Oils more satisfying than watercolors”—is so true for me too these days.

teabird

Great description! It’s so hard to compare different types of tea sometimes, so I (too) love that watercolor/oil analogy.

__Morgana__

Thanks! I was struggling for a way to capture what I was thinking. It is so difficult to use a single scale to compare the range of teas. I suppose another way of looking at it is like comparing a comedy to a drama, or journalism to fiction. It’s much easier to compare apples to apples than apples to oranges.

Doulton

I also love your comment that “oils are more satisfying than watercolors”. I am that kind of tea-drinker (as well as that kind of art-viewer). I like the big bang, the grand thing, the epic reach of some teas. It’s a great analogy.

Ricky

I’m sold on this one =]

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98
drank Masala Chai by Samovar
2036 tasting notes

After today’s lovely pu erh experience, I decided I needed something sweet and chewy, and I thought for a minute about having some Tazo decaf chai. Then I thought since it was a relatively slow Friday, why not have something that was likely to be better when I had some time to make it.

So I broke out my sample of this.

OMG. OMG. OMG. This flavor. I can’t believe I even considered the Tazo decaf. I must have been temporarily insane.

First, let me say that I didn’t even follow the instructions very well and I used ingredients that would likely make purists wince. I used splenda instead of sugar (hey, I’m a middle aged mom and I have to watch those calories!), I used 1% milk instead of whole milk (same) and I used the only loose leaf “black” tea within easy reach and not flavored, and that was the Mariage Freres Princeton Darjeeling.

Second, there was a scary moment when all the water boiled away and I feared I would end up stir frying the leaves. I remember thinking when I dumped the leaves into the pot that 1 cup of water boiling for 10 minutes was likely to completely boil away and what then? The “what then” turned out to be that almost exactly at the moment the water disappeared, it was time to put the milk in. Whoa.

Third, I am the first to admit that I have only recently been deflowered when it comes to chai, and the chai I’ve had has been Tazo/Starbucks. So whether this is good on the scale of chais is something I can’t say.

But whether it is good in an absolute sense, I can. It’s like drinking freshly baked gingerbread. Even with 1% milk, it’s rich, thick, creamy. It is so yum, there ought to be a law.

And of course, I went to add it to my order and they’re out of it. Sigh.

Preparation
Boiling 8 min or more
Stephanie

Can Samovar do no wrong?? Chewy gingerbread? I must try this.

__Morgana__

It was soooo yum — and I am excited because it appears that I forgot I’d ordered this sample in my first sample order from them, so I ordered it again in the second. Which means I get to do this again, even though they’re out of the tins. Woot!

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91
drank Blood Orange Pu-erh by Samovar
2036 tasting notes

Sam O. Var is my new love. I’m going to elope with him. Right now. He can do no wrong, in my book.

I know what you’re going to say — it’s just so much pixie dust, that tinkling of little bells you hear in your mind, that image you see of little cartoon hearts floating up around your head like soap bubbles, that frisson of anticipation. He’s bound to disappoint you at some point. Just give it some time. It always happens.

You could be right. You could be. But not today. I am six for six today, six for six of Samovar samples that I would most definitely drink again. (Now if only Breakfast Blend would come back in stock in the large tin, I could complete an order and qualify for free shipping.)

The aroma out of this packet is deliciously orange. Not tart, not thin, not artificial-smelling. It’s a rich orange smell, almost creamy, like the orange in fine orange-flavored chocolates. It predominates over the pu erh until the leaves and those little bits of orange rind and ginger are wet, when the tea starts to share the stage. After multiple steeps, the aroma of the wet leaves and the tea itself is still deliciously orange, and the grapefruit is there as well. The ginger is pretty subtle, but that’s fine with me. I like my ginger subtle.

The orange in the flavor is mellow and deep, like a very ripe, very juicy orange — but more. The fact is I don’t think I’ve ever eaten a fresh orange that is this orangy. It must be a synergy in the blend, with the other flavors bringing more orange out of the orange. I suspect this is the primary role of the ginger, along with adding a bit of spice that stays on the tongue along with the orange in the finish, and persists, pleasantly, for quite a while.

This is not a star vehicle for the pu erh; rather it is part of a terrific ensemble cast. It balances, it interacts, it comes to the front from time to time to deliver a forest-floor-after-rain note and then retreats to a foundational presence with the rest of the flavors.

I took this through 5+ steeps. Unfortunately I was interrupted with a phone call during the third, and didn’t get off the phone until it was time for the fifth. All the more reason to add this to my next order, so I can enjoy it again in peace.

Preparation
Boiling 2 min, 0 sec
JacquelineM

Sam O. Var = most clever!!!

__Morgana__

I was getting jealous of the relationship with Thomas, so I had to invent my own pretend beau. Lol.

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Alas and alack. My jasmine blueberry sample is devoid of blueberries. Seriously. I looked for them everywhere and it appears not a single one made it into the sample. Sob. Sniff.

But the dry leaves do smell like blueberries, and of course, of jasmine, though these are underneath the cough syrupy thing that the Tropical Green also had. The tea steeps to a dark yellow and has, as Stephanie said, a blueberry aroma — that distinctive, tart smell that comes from berries that have been baked into something and are fresh from the oven. There is jasmine mixed in as well, which brings to mind breakfast outdoors under a vine-adorned arbor.

I am disappointed with the lack of blueberries. I don’t feel I can evaluate this properly without them. The tea is tasty enough, but I’m left with the feeling that what I’m tasting is just the blueberry flavoring, and wondering what the taste would be like with the actual berries….

Preparation
175 °F / 79 °C 1 min, 30 sec
Stephanie

Oh how sad there were no blueberrries! :(
My sample only had about two. So, maybe they’re really just there as decoration? But even those two really added an “authenticity” to the blend.

To the maker of this tea, wherever you are, —please add more berries! :)

LiberTEAS

I don’t know if this helps or not… but the actual dried berries in the blend would add very, very little to NO flavor to the actual taste of the tea. The additions in tea (such as dried fruit chunks or berries, flower petals, pieces of nut, etc) are there generally for aesthetic purposes and the flavor that you taste in flavored teas is achieved through flavoring oils (or in the cases of floral teas such as rose or jasmine, in layering the young tea leaves with the flowers during processing so that the tea leaves can absorb the essence from the flowers).

__Morgana__

Thanks, LiberTEAS, for the info. That does help. Still, I don’t feel comfortable assigning this a number. Even if they are primarily aesthetic, the fact that they aren’t present affects my impression of the tea.

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84
drank Lotus by Tazo
2036 tasting notes

This, too, is not a bad decaf choice for those nights when you’re too tired to spend much time on preparation and just want something to warm you up as quickly as possible.

I can’t say I know what lotus is supposed to taste like. I haven’t eaten lotus that I know of. Of course, if I was a lotophage, I probably wouldn’t care what it tasted like. Or indeed about much of anything. This tea doesn’t exactly have a narcotic effect, though it is relaxing enough.

Regardless of what it is supposed to taste like, the lotus in this tea is a very subtly flowery, slightly sweet, slightly green-tasting flavor. It isn’t as strong as jasmine or rose. It smells a tiny bit like the polleny smell you get when you stick your nose into a flower.

It’s interesting the first few times you have it, and though I can’t imaging ever craving it, I can see having it from time to time when I’m looking for a decaf. One thing it has going for it in that department is that it doesn’t scream “I’m decaffeinated! I’m less than!” like some others I’ve tried recently.

Preparation
175 °F / 79 °C 1 min, 30 sec

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75

About the same as the last time, even with a significantly longer steep. I didn’t have a lot of the sample left though. Scale showed it was slightly under 1 cup’s worth.

I will say, though, that I just went to take a sip to find my cup empty. The cup smelled so divine, I wanted to lick it!

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66

More flavorful and less subtle with more leaves. I used my new scale (the one from Upton with a cup measurement) and actually went to about 1.2 cups worth of leaves, and tried steeping a bit longer as well. Significant improvement. Bumping the rating a couple of points

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72

This is now the third tea with this general flavor profile that I’ve tried. The other two were bagged, from Tazo and Numi, respectively, and neither was anything to write home about.

This one, on the other hand, has something going for it that the other two did not: the tea. You don’t have to search for it — it’s right there, mild, juicy, and green, without any bitterness at all, knitting the other flavors together. It’s successful enough in this respect that I don’t even realize I’m drinking lemon myrtle. Bless you, dear tea.

The ginger and lemon are nicely balanced as well. There’s nothing harsh or artificial tasting about them and there’s no single flavor running away with this tea, which is what I appreciate most in a well executed blend.

I am coming to realize that though I thought I liked ginger pretty well, having survived on the dry version of it during the early months of my pregnancies and appreciating it with sushi, I am not sure it’s my favorite ingredient for a green tea blend. I think I appreciate it more in a tea as part of a baked goods flavor which tends to belong more in the black tea blend genre. That said, if I were going to partake of a ginger/lemon green tea blend, this would be the current frontrunner.

Preparation
175 °F / 79 °C 2 min, 0 sec

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77

One of the reasons I started drinking tea a couple of months ago was because I thought I was drinking way more Diet Coke than any one person ought to, and I was looking for a tasty no-cal alternative. Never would I have guessed at the time that the worlds of fizzy, flavored water and tea would overlap.

It occurred to me to ask myself whether this is in fact a good thing. But on balance it seemed snobby to even ask that question, and so I answered that I am much too much of a tea neophyte to start displaying snobbery (at least openly) at this point and I should just shrug and say why the heck not.

Yeah, it is unmistakably root beer when you give this sample a sniff upon opening the packet. And since I now know what rooibos smells and tastes like by itself, I can smell that as well.

Brewed up, it does smell like hot root beer, minus the head, though I don’t get a creamy smell as I’d expect from the float part of the name. There is obviously no fizz, and drinking a hot/warm root beer flavored beverage is a little weird, but then I am a pro at drinking room temperature Diet Cokes so again, why not. The flavor is sweet like root beer, but not overly sugary, and the rooibos complements it nicely. As others have said, though, there’s no perceptible “float” aspect.

In all, I think this is well done. It’s something I might drink every once in a while. I don’t drink root beer that often, so I’d probably drink it about as much as I drink root beer, which is to say maybe once or twice a year at the most. It’s not that I don’t like root beer, it’s that I don’t think to seek it out to buy. It doesn’t have caffeine, which is something I normally want in a soda. And when I’m eating out it’s not typically on the menu, at least not in diet form.

It would be interesting to try this iced and taste next to an actual root beer.

Preparation
Boiling 6 min, 0 sec
SoccerMom

I’ve been dying to try this tea. YES please ice it and post notes!!!

__Morgana__

I will try — I only have this one little sample packet and I’m wondering if there’s enough to avoid overdilution with the icing…

SoccerMom

Oh don’t risk it then!

AmazonV

hot brew, put in fridge, no ice, DELICIOUS

LiberTEAS

I placed my order with Necessities about 10 days ago, but still haven’t yet received it. Other orders that I’ve placed since then have arrived (such as my order from Den’s). I hope it arrives soon… because I want to try this!

AmazonV

i suggest emailing and checking up on the order, she just recently had her latest child and may be a bit behind.

Doulton

She is behind! I placed an order almost three weeks ago; tea merchants are usually quite prompt.

AmazonV

before the baby i can say delivery was quite speedy

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Profile

Bio

I got obsessed with tea in 2010 for a while, then other things intruded, then I cycled back to it. I seem to be continuing that in for a while, out for a while cycle. I have a short attention span, but no shortage of tea.

I’m a mom, writer, gamer, lawyer, reader, runner, traveler, and enjoyer of life, literature, art, music, thought and kindness, in no particular order. I write fantasy and science fiction under the name J. J. Roth.

Personal biases: I drink tea without additives. If a tea needs milk or sugar to improve its flavor, its unlikely I’ll rate it high. The exception is chai, which I drink with milk/sugar or substitute. Rooibos and honeybush were my gateway drugs, but as my tastes developed they became less appealing — I still enjoy nicely done blends. I do not mix well with tulsi or yerba mate, and savory teas are more often a miss than a hit with me. I used to hate hibiscus, but I’ve turned that corner. Licorice, not so much.

Since I find others’ rating legends helpful, I added my own. But I don’t really find myself hating most things I try.

I try to rate teas in relation to others of the same type, for example, Earl Greys against other Earl Greys. But if a tea rates very high with me, it’s a stand out against all other teas I’ve tried.

95-100 A once in a lifetime experience; the best there is

90-94 Excellent; first rate; top notch; really terrific; will definitely buy more

80-89 Very good; will likely buy more

70-79 Good; would enjoy again, might buy again

60-69 Okay; wouldn’t pass up if offered, but likely won’t buy again

Below 60 Meh, so-so, iffy, or ick. The lower the number, the closer to ick.

I don’t swap. It’s nothing personal, it’s just that I have way more tea than any one person needs and am not lacking for new things to try. Also, I have way too much going on already in daily life and the additional commitment to get packages to people adds to my already high stress level. (Maybe it shouldn’t, but it does.)

That said, I enjoy reading folks’ notes, talking about what I drink, and getting to “know” people virtually here on Steepster so I can get ideas of other things I might want to try if I can ever again justify buying more tea. I also like keeping track of what I drink and what I thought about it.

My current process for tea note generation is described in my note on this tea: https://steepster.com/teas/mariage-freres/6990-the-des-impressionnistes

Location

Bay Area, California

Website

http://www.jjroth.net

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