Butiki Teas

So I finished this tea up today. I love this tea so much, but not enough to buy it again. I think it is because I have so many teas. Hopefully, I will be able to stick to just certain types of teas. Who knows!

Anyhow, after steeping this tea, I remembered how smooth this was! The scent of the dry leaf was, again, fruity and berry-like. Just like the other Kenyan teas from Butiki. The scent of the leaves post-steep smelled burnt, toasty, and roasty. It was almost off-putting. However, as soon as the liquid hit my mouth I knew I was wrong! This tea is delicious and smooth. I had to let it cool off to get the real flavors. There was some nutty and toasty and cocoa flavors to this.

I accidentally let this cool to room temperature. I still took a sip, and it tasted even better! I wonder what this tea is like cold! It was slightly sweet and fruity! Yum! No bitterness… no astringency! Very refreshing and soothing. I like!

I took the day off to run errands and relax today. I am so happy I did. I get to enjoy teas as well! This tea is so good! It gives me a soft but nice caffeine kick. The nutty notes definitely stand out, as well as the cocoa and slightly tobacco-ish notes. Good tea. The leaves look like yunnan leaves with its brown to light brown, soft, fuzzy waves/curls. It smells and tastes almost like yunnan as well!

I took the day off today to run errands and relax. I am happy I did that! I’m getting to drink lots of teas! :)

Wow! This one smells similar to the other Kenyan teas from Butiki teas. Delicious and sweet smelling!

The dry leaves are beautiful. They are twisted, soft, fuzzy leaves that are gold to black in color. They are also bulky, so while transferring it into one of my pretty washi tins, I had to be extra careful. The scent is like blueberries but very soft. I wasn’t sure if this was a black tea at first.

Steeped, it was a medium brown liquor. The taste was fantastic. Another great tea by Butiki Teas! Maybe I am a bit biased toward African teas also, but this tea is amazing. It isn’t bitter at all. I did not need any additives, though I might try next time to see if I can elicit other flavors. I love the natural sweetness in this tea. The light berries and cream type of flavor. It isn’t astringent either. Definitely another good one. I may purchase this in a large size if its available.

YUM!!!

I believe that the tea that I am drinking at the moment (courtesy of TeaEqualsBliss, thank you!) is the Almond Cookie rendition, rather than the Almond Indulgence.

Quite yummy! Sweet and nutty, tastes quite a bit like an almond cookie. Although it’s been quite a while since I’ve had it, this one reminds me of Almond Cookie from SpecialTeas. It has been quite a while though, so I can’t properly compare them, all I can say is that I taste almond and cinnamon and that sweet cookie like taste. It’s yummy!

Thanks again to my SororiTea Sister!

Ok, I don’t have a lot of experience with puerh teas. This was the second one that has passed my tonsils. From what I’ve read, puerh teas tend to be really robust, earthy, smokey, and hearty. This one is definitely robust, but refined; which is the big difference between this one and the first one I tried. I don’t think puerhs will ever be my favorite tea but this one has made me much more open to adding them to the cupboard. I plan to experiment with this one some more. Worth drinking.

This was my first time trying a purple tea. I look forward to trying more. As recommended by Butiki Teas, I tried it using different times and water temperatures. The info provided below was the first go round. I tried it at 160 degrees first and it tasted much like a lighter oolong, or perhaps a strong white. The blueberry was definitely present and pleasant, but didn’t hit you over the head. At the other extreme, i.e., boiling, this tea came across similar to a weakish black tea in color and taste. Again, the blueberry was nicely balanced. In short, I think this would be a great desert island tea because you could brew for whatever you were in the mood for and only need the one package. With that in mind, the tea stands on its own merits. It’s not a gimmick. Worth trying and enjoying.

This is one of the better peach flavored oolongs I’ve tried. The peach flavor tastes very natural and tea has nice little floral notes. My one small complaint is that when re-steeping it seemed to lose it’s peach flavor pretty quick; yet, the oolong does nicely by itself. A pleasant cup.

I’ve never had pumpkin creme brulee as a dessert. Plain old creme brulee I’ve had a few times and, I must confess, it’s not my favorite dessert. But, anything with pumpkin in it is a must try at my house. I’ve tried this one with milk and sugar and without. Both times brought back pleasant memories of my Grandmother’s “no crust impossible pumpkin pie”. However, this tea seemed to lack something. I can’t put my finger on it, but there is some hint of spice or flavoring that is absent or too understated for my palate. It’s a good tea, but I wouldn’t knock anyone over to get a cup. If you’re a pumpkin fiend I don’t think you’ll be unsatisfied, but neither will you be stunned.

Well first I have to say, WOW! This is a really, really good white tea. Generally, I prefer the whites to the greens because they tend to have less of a “fresh mown grass” flavor to them. This was incredibly light and fresh with hints of citrus to it. It gives the mild impression that you are drinking fruit juice instead of tea. As a few people have noted before, the tea leaves are huge. It comes with whole leaves still attached to twigs. This was a little tough to get in the brew basket of my two cup pot, but I decided to drop the leaves into the pot and use the basket as a strainer. Worked like a charm. If you like white teas, give this one a try. Highly recommended.

Hmm… a very interesting tea! It takes a little while for the flavor to develop on your tongue. I first taste an earthy tea flavor. This is closely followed by a tart fruit flavor that slowly finishes in a mellow, slightly astringent blueberry note. Very cool! I wish that there was more of a sweet blueberry flavor as I taste mostly an earthy tea. I will say that the tea base complements the subtle blueberry flavor. I also find the dry leaf to look awfully pretty as well. Love the cornflowers against the dark tea!

Sadly, this is my last Butiki Teas sample.. and it isn’t disappointing! This oolong is silky smooth and delicious. It has a nice floral flavor with strawberry that isn’t tart or bitter. I’ll be resteeping this one as much as I can! I really love Butiki’s peach oolong better though (it is pretty much perfect), and it is the favorite of the many I’ve tried from Butiki. All of them were stunning teas, so that is saying something. Any tea lover should really try Butiki. They are amazing! Butikiteas.com

I disagree with most other reviewers: although I can smell the peach in the leaf, I’m not tasting ANY peach at all in the brew. That having been said…

This is an incredibly floral smelling and tasting tea once brewed. I brewed for 2 min. (while the package said 4 min.), but I’m used to gongfu brewing with the oolongs I’ve had, so I still thought 2 min. might be too long. Not at all , as it turns out. The golden liquor smells and tastes gardenia-like, and the floral taste lingers in your mouth for a couple of minutes. This is brightly flowery with a very slightly vegetal underpinning, and not a trace of bitterness, nor any peach that I can taste. This is my kind of tea! I’m going to have to force myself to stop at one cup tonight.

Now I’m wondering if there’s any peach flavoring added at all, or if it’s just so juicy and flowery that someone decided it tasted like peaches and decided to call it that without adding any flavoring at all…? Going back to the kitchen to smell the package…tawk amongst yourselves…

I’m back. Okay. I smelled something sweet in the leaf, but now I’m doubting that it was actual peach. I think my nose interpreted the sweetness as peach because I expected to smell an artificial peach flavor. I think I’m just smelling the strong floral sweetness of the tea. It’s a different flavor than the eventual smell of the brewed tea, but really, when is that NOT the case with tea?

Weird thing though: I looked at the post-brew leaves, and saw what I think are added flowers (or just the middle of the flowers). They’re wet and don’t hold together well, but they’re kind of cream-colored and as far as I can tell are not tea. However, I can’t find these in the pre-brew leaves. Are the flowers rolled up in the tea and released in the brewing? What kind of flowers are they? Are they maybe…PEACH flowers? (Is there such a thing?)

Well, I admit to still being confused, but whatever this is, added flavors/flowers or not, it is absolutely delicious. If you don’t like flowery oolongs, this is not the tea for you, but I’m really enjoying it. Score two for Butiki (I also liked the Gyokuro sample I got from them, though I didn’t like the fact that it was completely crushed, and that there was barely enough for one cup). I think tomorrow I’ll try the Purple Pu-erh I got from them and see if we can go three for three!

This was a (rather scanty) free sample from Butiki with my recent order. I do appreciate free samples, esp. since they e-mailed me to offer me two of my choice right after I placed the order—at 10:15 on a Sunday night! Fabulous customer service. But this sample was barely enough for one cup. I’ve gotten a lot of tea samples and none were this small. It didn’t smell like anything in particular in the little ziploc bag, either.

This gyokuro makes up for my tiny sample by being really flavorful. It’s not as violently green as some gyokuro I had at a local teahouse; this is more of a sort of golden jade color. The smell in the cup is more spinach-y than the tea’s ultimate taste profile. The flavor is dry-ish (could be perceived as bitterness, but it fades so quickly that I don’t taste it as bitter), bright, and finishes with a wave of brothy/vegetal goodness typical of gyokuros. This “umami” flavor may be something you either like or hate, but I like it, and I was glad this sample had the typical flavors of this tea.

One issue I had with this tiny sample is that parts of it were crushed almost to powder (and I don’t believe it’s supposed to have extra powder in it, as some Japanese green teas do). This meant that using a regular mesh ball, I ended up with lots of dark green tea flecks in the bottom of the cup. With gyokuro’s strong flavors I would worry that this would influence the flavor even after I stop steeping and remove the ball, but I didn’t really notice that happening. Still I get the feeling that either the sample was taken from the bottom dregs of a larger container of tea, or the sample bag was crushed in shipping, breaking the tea quite a bit. Or maybe gyokuro is just very fragile, I don’t know. Whatever happened, I would think that Butiki would want to present this tea in its best light when sending it as a sample, but that’s not how it arrived.

I wouldn’t mind making gyokuro a permanent part of my tea cupboard, but I need to shop around a bit and decide what’s the best value/taste ratio. This one is $16.00/2 oz., which is not a deal-breaker but a tad expensive for my stash. I’ll continue my research to learn what is considered a good price for this type of tea. If you have a very very favorite gyokuro, feel free to communicate it to me!

Awesome! Thank you TeaEqualsBliss for sending me some of this tea.

This is really REALLY good. The peach flavor is strong and authentic. Sweet and juicy. One of the very best peach teas I’ve tried – if not the very best! YUM!!!

This sample was provided by Butiki in my last order – thank you so much!

I brewed this according to the directions on the directions on the package – 3 minutes at around 180 F. I probably should have used a little less water for the sample…

I’ve never had a South Korean green but I like this one! It is a bit reminiscent of spinach but it’s also very sweet and light. Definitely has a smooth and creamy mouthfeel with perhaps a bit of spice on the backend? Might be a tad astringent for yours truly however. Definitely worth checking out.

Butiki Teas, you did it again! :) I am totally impressed. I love how they named their company Butiki, which means lizard in Tagalog! Yep I’m Filipino! And they have a great variety of African teas, of which I am an absolute huge fan.

So onto Malawai White Peony. The leaves are very LARGE and of different colors. Some a deep green, some with brown, and others with yellow. They fit nicely in my kyusu.

The liquor was a very light yellow color. The scent was a little vegetal and floral. I love the taste! It is so light and refreshing! It goes down smoothly and is very clean. There is no astringency or bitterness to it. There is some green-ness to this taste, but not grassy. There is some floral tones with a slight sweetness to it. Overall, this is a good tea!

First, the dried leaves smell awesome…like pistachio paste I have used to make ice cream, so rich and nutty.
I brewed it according to Butiki’s instructions-so you know where I’m coming room.
The final tea’s aroma & flavor is not as strong as I would expect from the dried leaves, but that’s not a bad thing.
It’s slightly creamy (vegan, thank you) and pistachio nutty at the same time. Natural, smooth..almost if you mixed pistachio ice cream with vanilla ice cream, but not pistachio ice cream alone ;)
It’s a uniquely flavored tea, The (organic)green tea flavor is present, but is complimented with pistachios
oh, yes..I did add some sugar to it like Butiki suggested
Vegan!

I received this as a sample along with my order
nice, floral..roses, jasmine..is that calendula I’m tasting as well? I’ve only smelled it as a candle scent. Nice light Oolong. Tasty.
it blends so well,,,I taste it all-no competing flavors, slightly sweet
my sample is gone….

I received my package from Butiki Teas today and immediately ripped it open! Stacey sent me a sample of this blueberry purple tea. I heated up a pot of water and opened this small bag for a whiff. my my my! It smells absolutely delicious. It smells like blueberry flavored candy! I love the small bits of blue cornflowers. The leaves were small… and resembled something like the insides of a cardamom pod. They were black with bits of blue cornflowers. I brewed this up using a tetsubin and poured it into my small white cups. One very small one for tasting, one slightly larger one for my husband, and the other one for me.

The liquor appeared to be a medium brown color with a slight tinge of blue/purple. It smells just like the leaves but a little less intense. It tastes so GOOD! I noticed some floral tones but mostly blueberries and slight sweetness. There was no bitterness to it. I love this flavor. It is so smooth. It is like a blueberry cream or a blueberry yogurt without the sourness to it. Wow. I am in love with this tea. At the end of my sip, I detected a slight astringency in the back of my tongue. It wasn’t anything offensive though.

Another great tea from Butiki Teas! I haven’t been disappointed!

I’ve been holding onto the last couple Butiki samples I have because I love them so much, I want them to last. This tea is light and simple but elegant at the same time. The lovely chamomile serves as a base for a delicious lavender. Lavender reminds me of my grandma’s house. Just the two ingredients works well. It couldn’t be better! Another amazing tea from Butiki!

I was pretty excited to try this unique tea and I do like supporting small local vendors who bring us offerings like this so that was definitely a great reason to try it.

I steeped mine with 180 F water for around 3.5 minutes in a glass infuser mug. This is such a curious tea with very interesting properties. I agree with TeaEqualsBliss that at first it reminds me of a sencha both in flavor and consistency but the color and strength are more like a dark oolong and it definitely has an astringent finish. That’s the only thing that bugs me a bit so I am going to try doing a few other things with it including steeping at a lower temp. and cold brewing so my rating may go up a bit soon. I am leery of astringent teas due to my issues with acid reflux but it doesn’t seem to bother other people. This is pretty unique so if you aren’t afraid of something unusual I suggest you give it a try!

I tasted this from a sample that was added to my order. after trying it I immediately thought it would make a great summer tea. It’s really nice & smooth with a real cantaloupe aroma, flavor with a touch of cream. I had a little sugar handy just in case I may have needed it, but didn’t use it.
Another great tea from Butiki