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Anne has done a fantastic job recreating this marvellous blend. Frank’s reblends could never match up to the original, but this is seriously awesome. A generous smattering of real blueberries combined with a high quality base truly elevates this blend. The blueberry and flaky buttery pastry notes are poppin’. Couldn’t ask for a better blueberry tea.

My boyfriend just got back from a badass European excursion and spoiled the hell out of me. So much guilt ensues. Amongst the exclusive Oxford Street LUSH perfumes and killer magnets (one from Abbey Road Studios!) is a bounty of tea from various countries. It’s just all too much.

This quaint little teashop in Köln carries an interesting selection of flavoured teas, and he generously made a trip over to pick up a few blends. Apparently the owner is absolutely lovely.

A caramel blend with hazelnut brittle aways seems like a good idea. The dry leaf smells creamy and nutty. It’s like a cross between Simpson & Vail’s Caramel with Tea Desire’s Walnut Truffle.

Steeped, the scent of the liquor smells heavily of caramel, but in regards to the flavour, I’m mostly picking up on the brittle, although it’s not an obvious hazelnut. It’s more like a nut with a higher fat content such as walnut. There is absolutely zero astringency from the base. Actually, the base seems to be quite mild in general. So grateful to be able to experience a tea that’s been specially delivered to me from over 7000 kilometres away!

This is probably my record thus far, taking three years to write about a tea. For shame. To be fair, I had my Tisano blends packed up 100km from me for nearly two of those years, scarily enough, so I didn’t even get access to them again until nearly half a year ago.

Sipping on this two years past the best before sticker, I was expecting epic grossness but it hasn’t changed too much at all. This was never heavy on the traditional chai spices, but rather merely focusing on cinnamon alongside the cacao shells. This reminds me a lot of a DAVIDsTEA blend I experienced many years ago. I want to say Super Chocolate? This is like Aztec hot chocolate without the chillies.

This is also a sipdown since I only had a couple cups left anyway. Should have just polished it off back in Victoria!

Took a bag of this home from my museum shift. I wasn’t expecting much to begin with but it’s really not too bad. Prominent rooibos base but it isn’t actually all too woodsy and medicinal. I’d say it’s my favourite part about this. Red Velvet? Nah, it smells like raspberry caramel but tastes like raspberry cream, and smells quite a bit sweeter than it actually tastes.

Seriously not that bad, but I’d never buy it. I think I should take advantage of the beverage stash the museum provides for volunteers, especially now that it’s colder outside, and try all the teas they have to offer. I mean, why not?

This is a bittersweet sipdown. While I’m stoked to pare down my cupboard to make way for more tea coming in, and not letting this get old and stale, it’s sadsauce seeing that it’s been discontinued. This was one of my first favourite DAVIDsTEA blends when they opened shop here back in 2010. Such a unique flavour pairing of caramel corn and apple with a light green base. Guess they need to make room for all the blends that have 90% candy in them. Because who doesn’t love overly sweet tea and scumrings on their mugs!

Opening my cupboard wondering what to drink on this cold evening after spending my day off work volunteering at the museum, I saw this tin and realized that, wait a minute, I don’t think I’ve written about this tea yet. Do you know when I got this? On my birthday last year after having the greatest birthday meal ever with my mom. Seeing that my birthday is next week, that further made me realize that I need to stop hardcore failing and finally write about this. Gee, only took a year. Sigh.

I’m going to cut to the chase and say that this smells a hell of a lot better than it tastes. The flavour combination sounded full of win. Brazilian cocoa, currant, and rose combined with Assam (and Ceylon)? Are you kidding me? The dry leaf smells so dark: dark chocolate combined with a deep, dark currant note. Yet I barely smell the rose, and when it comes to the flavour, I can barely detect it either. Rather, it’s the high-pitched Ceylon that takes over the whole show, and I can barely notice any Assam qualities in this blend.

What’s very peculiar about this blend is that in spite of the generous smattering of cocoa nibs and rich cocoa aroma, the chocolate note tastes thin, like it’s been cut with other crappy ingredients. We’re talking mockolate. Why? And it’s not much better with 2% milk. The astringency piped down a bit but that’s about it.

More like November Siesta. I don’t know if it’s psychological but I swear this is relaxing the bejesus out of me, and normally chamomile or other BS sleepy-time blends do absolutely nothing for me. Yet, not long after I started drinking this, it hit me and I really want to go to bed. Granted, I had a long, mentally exhausting day filled with an absurdly high percentage of difficult, rude, entitled, and bizarre people/interactions. Constant, non-freaking-stop. The kind of day that really questions how some people, actually, how so many people come to be the way they are, and how they sleep at night.

So here I am past midnight waiting for my dishwasher to finish up while I allow my nails to dry and I wanted some tea to keep me company and warm me up. The mere look of the dry leaf automatically wins given the fact that there is whole star anise in here. So beautiful!

I’m a little all over the place with chamomile. I appreciate its fragrance and skincare benefits, and in tea, it depends on what it’s paired with, my mood, etc. Can be a little overpowering, but I do like it here. I know many aren’t into licorice root either, and I too, while loving licorice flavours (especially star anise), find that the root can be a little tricky.

The licorice root is a tad cloying here but this is still pleasant to drink under these circumstances. I’m not tasting the star anise so much, though. To my palate, this is equal parts chamomile and licorice with a shot of citrus. There’s something cooling and refreshing about this too, in the background behind the licorice and chamomile.

Another example of having a few cups of this before actually bothering to log this. The dry leaf doesn’t smell nearly as smoky as I expected. I can’t really even detect any smoke, actually. This smells sweet and spicy more than anything, like candied ginger mixed with some cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla. I would have even expected there to be some licorice in here based on its sweetness in the pouch, but there isn’t.

In terms of flavour, the black pepper comes through. The ginger and cinnamon are the main spices in this, with a touch of nutmeg, which is faint. I can’t get any cardamom or clove, unfortunately, and those are my two favourite spices (ok, and star anise too). The vanilla is present, for sure. Can’t taste the honeybush in here, and rather taste a slightly tannic black tea base, with the mildest whisper of smoke. I normally detest any smoke in tea, even the slightest bit, but it’s not bad since it seems to blend effortlessly into the spices.

This is like my fifth cup of it already so perhaps it would be a good idea to report on this. The scent of the dry leaf is chocolate, alright. There is a generous amount of cacao shells in here so you better believe this smells like a bar of dark chocolate.

In terms of flavour, I am getting the cacao notes first and foremost, followed by some honeyed and mineral notes from the base. There is a little creaminess there, just a hint. The base also becomes slightly astringent once cooled after half an hour (TWD is distracting me!) but not in a bad way.

My second favourite of the three FUNdraiser blends.

Love the scent of the dry leaf. It’s bursting with juicy blackberry, and it’s nice to experience real blackberry and not artificial juice crystals I get from a lot of fruit-flavoured teas. The tea leaves are an unusual, beautiful dark green, twisted and fluffy.

Steeped, this is absolutely lovely. The base is sweet, mellow, with no trace of vegetal notes whatsoever. And that blackberry flavour is consistent with the scent of the dry leaf. There is a layer of cream going on too, I swear. Like a heaping bowl of berries ‘n’ cream . Not sure whether that was intentional or not.

Great work, 52teas!