T2

Kiki came home for the day and is kicked back in her recliner watching TV. It’s a hot one outside today and thankfully cool inside. She’s about ready to fall asleep and then ZING! a sip of black tea.

“Oh, I like this one. I LIKE this one. Is that jasmine? That’s… omg… new episodes on “Money Heist.” burrp It’s a jasmine burp, it’s a black oolong and uh, am I right?"

No haha!

“No? It’s a… Am I right at all?”

Hold on!

“What did you say? Is anything right? Ok so it’s a white tea!”

Haha, you’re a funny one, Kiki.

“I dunno. It’s good!”

It’s called French Earl Grey. It has fruity flavors and bergamot and rose and flower petals.

“Alright that’s black. Isn’t that black? Alright.”

It has fruity peachy flavor in it…

“Okay…”

…and bergamot flavor…

“Okay…”

…and rose and flower petals.

“Alright. yawn Very, very nice.”

This has a full mouthfeel that sets it apart from all the flavored black teas and black teabags I’ve had lately. It makes me think of a tobacco-tasting black tea but I wouldn’t say I taste tobacco. Upon another sip, maybe I would say tobacco. Woody tobacco? The full, peachy flavoring and moderate bergamot flavoring play really well with the base tea. This is cohesive. The peach lingers in the aftertaste. Pretty good. I feel like the heft of this tea combined with the fruity and floral tastes would make a good cup on a hard-frost early spring morning.

Mastress Alita’s sipdown challenge Saturday, August 21st: World Honey Bee Day Tea #4

From last night and second steep tonight!  Thanks again for this one, AJRimmer.  It’s rooibos with a bit of spices and covered in sticky honey.  Not a bad cup – I wouldn’t mind MORE honey and spices.  Otherwise, the mug tastes like raisins and rum.  Somehow I was wishing for a rum-like cup before I steeped this up?  Or maybe I’ve tried this before and didn’t write a note?  Who knows.   The second steep wasn’t very red, even after steeping a long time – mostly spicy and seemed like a weaker rooibos chai.  But instantly upon sipping, it was comforting and I wanted to fall asleep.  Not the worst cup from T2 but somehow that bar has been very very low judging from the handful of T2 blends I have tried.
Steep #1 // 20 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // just boiled // 21 minute steep

It’s ok for the price I guess, I’m not sure why it tastes stronger (better) than their Irish breakfast tea, I kinda like it. Typical breakfast tea flavour.

It’s acceptable, malty aroma with a little bittery taste, straightforward but the profile maybe too simple to enjoy alone. I’ll try brewing it stronger next time because I want more from this.
Update: muuuuuuuch better with a heavier version and a splash of milk

To be honest I have no expectations on this one after reading the ingredient labels, it is better than what I imagined but still not good.
Due of the oatmeal the tea has a thicker body, you could smell caramel congee, the taste is a bit sad, like if you soak oatmeals in hot water sometimes it got soury, this one tastes like that (I steeped it like normal black tea, not sure if I did anything wrong here), along with a hint of cinnamon.
Overall you don’t feel much tea flavour, it tastes more of oatmeal water. I’m not sure if I want to try it again with milk and I want to have a good talk with the blender..

Thank you again, AJRimmer! But oo boy, this is a weird cup. haha. I mixed this weird blue rooibos powder in milk. Clumping was annoying, but I have this habit of adding matcha or hot chocolate or this sort of stuff to just cleaned mugs with water in the bottom, so that is definitely not helping clumping. Overall, the flavor is like a chalky berry vitamin and I’m not sure who thought that was a good idea. At least it’s not overly sugary. Fun to try but don’t really want to try it again. haha.

Do not buy this tea! They changed the ingredients and it will give you tummy cramps! I am literally curled up with a hot bag on my tummy! This should be off the shelf!

Thanks again, AJRimmer! (You sent so many teas to try…) AJRimmer was less than enthused about this one, but I’m always up for trying (most) things. A matcha made with rooibos? Sounds weird! I mixed this up with some warmed milk… it IS fairly weird. Looks like strawberry Nesquik. Chalky, beets, a hint of mint. Nothing I would call red velvet. I expected little woody chunks of rooibos, but I couldn’t really tell it was rooibos either. Sweet enough without tasting like stevia, and a good way to use some aging milk.

Strange VariaTEA TTB: Tea #13

Only have a few more teas from the box to sip through and then I’ll be ready to start organizing a shipping list for this one – super exciting!

I don’t normally love chocolate teas, as I’ve sad time and time again, but it’s hard to get access to blends from T2 here in Canada so I took the opportunity to try this one. It starts pretty fine and tasty on the palate: rich chocolate with a little bit of a roasty undertone. There’s something very unpleasant to the finishing note though. I’m struggling to think of how to describe it, but it’s sort of simultaneously like breathing in a bunch of dust but also just, like, eating a packet of sugar. Really not great – I didn’t finish the mug because it threw me off that much…

I’m continuing to work through all the T2 Samples that are in my cabinet. Finished this sachet this morning before our first day of summer break starts. Yesterday I brewed it exactly as directed. Sadly this morning I was distracted and let it steep too long.

This tea has a strong grassy smell when brewing and the taste is prevalent (which I enjoy). You definitely want to watch the water temperature and brewing length as it is a delicate tea. I definitely would get this one in the future. It was a very pleasant cup of tea.

Thanks again, AJRimmer!  Another sample sipped down.  I can’t say this is precisely how I thought it would taste… I guess it has a hint of something like sorbet, but mostly there is a herbal sort of flavor going on.  The brew is medium colored pink.  It’s not quite watermelon!  Not much to say here.  I swear I didn’t taste ANY of these ingredients which is strange. Muddled and herbalish and not the tea for me but happy to sample.
Steep #1 // 1 1/2 teaspoons // 19 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep 
Steep #2 // just boiled // 3 min
2021 Sipdowns: 83 (This + ESPEmporium’s Miami Ice)

I LOVED the smell of this on when I opened the sample. After it steeped, I did anticipate a stronger peach taste, so that colored my tasting. However, I did enjoy this mug of tea.

Received about a month ago from a lovely new tea friend who sent me a few T2 samples. Not sure what I feel about the “sweet smoky contradiction” but I did enjoy the mint flavor. I’d like to try this one a second time to form a real “thumbs up vs thumbs down” opinion. That said, I guess it didn’t wow me enough.

My boyfriend really liked the combination of cake and milky chai, so we decided to go for the combo again. I much prefer Bird and Blend’s version (pumpkin pie or plain). There’s something about this that doesn’t sit right. There seems to be a weirdly artificial flavor overtaking everything. The balance of sweetness just isn’t right either.

Today’s iced latte with added caramel which is becoming my nightly snack it seems. This actually is pretty tasty. The first few sips were mostly caramel from the syrup but since then it’s been a lot of thick, fudgey brownie notes. Reminds me of Pudtea’s Caramel Brownie tea, which I enjoyed a lot, so this is a nice find given Pudtea is on indefinite hiatus.

#tiffanys2021sipdown Tea #180 overall / Tea #4 for May
An Ode to Tea, Q is for the Queen’s Peach by T2 (gifted by Brianna aka @briannadrinkstea) 14/23
Sunday 5/2 — T2 the Queen’s Peach. Took the entire amount Brianna gave me and did a cold brew pitcher. I did not read any of the ingredients in advance but was looking forward to a peach tea, I have not found one yet that I like…. Ended up being a slightly sweet heavily turmeric spicy tea. I like turmeric in my tea actually but was not prepared for this to be what I was tasting, thought the orange was going to be a peach flavor/taste. Once I knew what I was getting into as I sipped the whole pitcher it was enjoyable but not a purchase. — Wait, this doesn’t have any turmeric in it? Must be the ginger I was tasting? Hmm, interesting…
#tiffanydrinkstea #tiffanys2021 #tiffanysfaves #tiffanyinthe614 #tiffanysteasipdown

I bought this tea to bump up my order for free shipping, and I didn’t expect to like it as much as I did! Judging from the other comments though, this tea is a bit finnicky.

Opening the box, it smells like a generic flavored tea- all scented candle and a bit artificial. Not a good sign. I ended up using just under boiling water and eyeballed the steep, and to my surprise, it was so good that I had another!

Perhaps underbrewing this tea helped it. The other comments are abysmal and I can see why- I let my second cup steep a bit too long and the lingering aftertaste gave me a headache.

Thanks to a new to me tea group on FB, I was sent a bunch of green tea samples from T2. I randomly picked this one out of the package. It was a great start! I truly wish I had more to try as an iced tea. I tried it per directions at 175 degrees steeped for 3 minutes.

Found it to be pretty well balanced and would put this up there with one of my favorite pineapple flavor teas.

Sipdown! (54 | 258)

My very last T2 sample! The black tea here looked tiny and a bit dusty, so I only steeped it for 2 minutes.

Whoa, this is basically just a mouthful of pepper. I guess I can taste the ginger as well, bit of cinnamon, and, if I really look for it, a subtle note of pineapple.

But mostly, it’s pepper. Nope.

Sipdown! (53 | 257)

Almost done with these T2 swap samples!

This one is fairly decent. I do get a nice cooked apple flavor, and something grainy that reminds me of healthy muffins. But I think it’s the maple that has an artificial taste to it, which is a bit of a turn-off for me. And the green base is virtually flavorless, with just a hint of dry grassiness.

It’s drinkable but nothing special, unfortunately.

Sipdown! (48 | 252)

I can pretty much say without a doubt that this won’t be for me, given the strong chocolate flavoring smell, but we’ll give it a try!

Hmm… Well, it’s actually more almond and hazelnut than chocolate, which is nice. The nut flavor has a nice buttery quality and very much reminds me of roasted almonds.

However, there is definitely chocolate flavoring, of which I am not a fan, and also it’s a bit too sweet from the brittle pieces. A shame, because that roasted nut flavor is quite nice!

(I’m going to leave off a rating just because my aversion to chocolate flavoring really does ruin this for me…)

Sipdown! (47 | 251)

Holy crap Batman, this tea has such a high rating!

I’m not saying it’s bad, in fact it’s quite delicious. I love jasmine pearls, and these are undoubtedly high quality. I’m just surprised by the average of 89!

Anyway, the tea is light and fragrant with a nice sweet and natural jasmine flavor. Smooth and almost creamy, like other fine jasmine pearls I’ve tried. There’s a lingering sweet and nectarous floral finish.

Like I said, very good! I don’t have any Teavivre jasmine pearls handy, but it would be fun to compare. That being said, this tea is priced higher than even the most expensive grade of jasmine pearl from Teavivre, and I can’t imagine it being worth that much…