Blue Teapot

There’s such a mix of teas that I can’t really distinguish any particular kind. It is a nice looking blend though, with jasmine buds, and calendula and rose petals. No apricot though, oddly enough.

Why are there so many frickin’ twigs in this tea? It’s not supposed to be a kukicha! Interestingly I’m tasting an almost nutty undertone to the apricot flavour, right now.

I forgot how long I steeped this – oh well. I got to enjoy it with my friends who are both tea-holics. Good times. :)

I steeped this a bit longer than maybe recommended with a white tea but it didn’t seem to hurt it, maybe because the delicate whites are mixed with a few different and possibly more resilient greens in this blend. The apricot flavour is quite strong but there’s a perfumy flavour present aswell, possibly from the the jasmine blossoms.

Steeped it twice, unfortunatly it doesn’t seem to resteep very well. :(

This makes a light, delicate brew. The hint of apricot in the flavour was nice, although it smelled a bit overwhelming when I first opened the tin.

I’m so in love with my new tea strainer right now. This is one of the finer-textured teas in my cabinet so before I’d always ended up with a thick layer of ‘sludge’ on the bottom of my cup. No more! Now I can enjoy its toasted herbal nutty goodness without spending half an hour picking leaf bits out of my teeth afterwards. :D

The flavour to me is a combination of vegetal, nutty, and baked, and it’s on the verge of tasting like one of those “good for you” herbal drinks – but not quite. I don’t mind it but I feel like I want something a bit ‘more’ in it.

It’s been awhile since I’ve drunk this so I decided to give it a go for something different today. The taste is very vegetal as I’ve said before but it has a richness to it that’s nice enough. I am noticing that I feel more awake and energetic, which is a point in this drink’s favour.

This is my second time sampling yerba mate and it tastes…green (though not unpleasently so) and there’s a hint of nuttiness. It doesn’t give me the energy jolt that a black tea would, but this late in the day that’s probably a good thing. I don’t have much experience drinking yerba mate but this one seems pretty decent to me.

This was the last of this tea and all that was left were the tiny broken bits at the bottom and most of those were small enough to get out through the holes in my strainer. I feel like I need one of those special yerba mate straws (bombillas?) to drink this, practically.

I doubt I’ll get more of this tea, it was a good intro to green teas when I first started drinking loose-leaf tea, but I’ve moved on to better things.

Backlogging from earlier today.

I’ve got maybe 2 cups worth of tea left.

The problem with getting down to the bottom of a bag of tea is that you get all the little bits that escape the strainer and they slosh around in the bottom of your cup and get stuck in your teeth.

BTW I think I finally found the only dried red current present in my entire supply.

Trying to use up my bag of this stuff.

Re-steeped the leaves from last night and it came out a little weak. Meh.

Steeped for 1.5 minutes. The tea wasn’t bitter but I couldn’t taste and strawberry or current flavours in it with this short a steeping time. The mix of green teas seems a little weird because you lose the individual flavours and characteristics of each tea.

This tea used to be my favorite but now that I’ve tasted the really good quality stuff I’m not as enamoured with it. The mix of green teas tends to get very bitter very easily and the strawberry flavour could stand to be a bit stronger. It’s still much better than the bagged stuff, and the flavour of the Genmaicha is particularly prominent.