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A little backlogging.

Last night I went to a vegan dinner at the Kaleisia Tea Lounge that was hosted by this local farm using seasonal ingredients. It sounded really cool, and the food was tasty, but the whole thing was executed poorly. The food was just brought out to us without them telling us what was in it or the ingredients. They didn’t talk about the local farm that it came from. The entree, which was this zuchinni-quinoa wrap thingie was really interesting, but it was just brought out to us with little fanfare. There was some kind of berry sauce but they didn’t explain it. It was disappointing. Or maybe I just care too much about analyzing my food. I imagine if the chef was there he could talk for hours about the kind of food he made..

Anyway, when I got there, I was disappointed to learn they weren’t serving any tea with dinner, you had to buy it separately. They WERE giving out wine, for some odd reason, but wine is so hit or miss for me. I had just missed the end of “happy hour” by a few minutes, where all teas were discounted. I could have bought a tea of the month at a discounted price, but none of the flavors jumped out at me, and none of them were green. I really really wanted a green tea, and I knew if I bought one of the “tea of the month”s to save a buck, I’d just be disappointed I didn’t buy a green tea. I don’t know if that’s really true, but that was my thinking at the time.

So, long story short, I got a dragonwell. It’s actually not too badly priced by the ounce at this tea shop, but I have SOOOO much tea (especially of the dragonwell variety) I don’t need anymore at the moment. This was really vegetal, but definitely drinkable. It was very much a green tea.

As a side note, at this vegan dinner I went by myself, but ended up meeting another solo person and we chatted for a hella long time. Maybe we’ll become tea buddies. I need more local tea buddies, besides forcing all tea on my boyfriend..

Drinking some more of this, since Azzrian suggested I drink some pu-erh tea and eat yogurt to help with my bloating. I do feel better, not 100%, but definitely better.

I tried to steep this tea longer to see if I could bring out more of that pu-erh flavor that wasn’t so strong last time. Eh, no dice. It’s still a really good tea, but I feel like it’s very overly minty and the pu-erh base is hard to detect. It could be any base, really. As it cools I think maaaaaaybe I could taste the pu-erh base a little more, but this is definitely very minty. Not bad at all, though.

Oh, and speaking of pu-erh, my testimonial was featured on Numi “Pu-Erh to the people” page, so I won two free boxes tea. It’s not a huge prize, but I’ll take it. Not sure if this shows up for the rest of you, but there I am (click “Share It/Testimonials” to see mine).
https://www.facebook.com/numitea/app_206491579464581

Today I’m out at a vegetarian festival and spending the day in St. Augustine. Weee. 

Unfortunately, I’m feeling so bloated all day today. Already had some matcha and random green tea (which I did not log), and even took some medicine, but still feeling bloated and blehhhh. 

I don’t know this area well but I found a coffee shop that has a lot of different teas. It’s so disorganized. It’s really just a bunch of glass containers and random teas all stacked on top of each other, in front, and behind. You can’t even SEE all the teas at once and there in this tiny little corner and you have to crane your neck. So NOT a tea store. LOL. But I’ll take what I can get. 

So I figure since I have all these teas at my disposal, I would make a random concoction to do something about my bloating. I do a little google homework on what herbs are best. Anise, fennel, and peppermint. Well, they have ONE of those herbs – mint (peppermint or spearmint? I have no idea). But just to make things interesting I start rummaging through the teas and adding a random assortment of other herbs. My final concoction had this as the ingredients:

Mint
Ginger
Spicy orange
Apple

It’s um… interesting. I thought I would throw in some fruit for some vitamin C but mint doesn’t mix well with fruit. And I threw in the ginger because.. Why not, right?

I also brought along some honey juuuust in case. It’s not the worst tea, but it’s not amazing. Obviously being an herbal tea blender is not in my immediate future. Only time will tell if it helps the bloating 

The BF wanted to go to a cigar/beer joint here, so I brought along my tea. They also have tea here but it’s ONLY Celestial Seasonings Berry tea. Um..no. So here I am at a cigar bar, sipping my crazy herbal tea, surrounded by smoke, alcohol, and jazz music. I’m sorta hip. 

As a side note, I wish St. Augustine had a true tea shop. It has so many other cool stores, dangit. Then I could move here and work at one. I could open one myself, but I’m soooo lazy and unmotivated. But who knows, maybe one day I will. You heard it first on this abnormally long and over-detailed tasting note. 

There are so many intriguing matcha flavors, but this flavor appealed to me because it’s a flavor I like, but is much harder to get. Back in the day I used to drink amaretto sours, but those can be pricey and full of sugar. Amaretto is good on its own, but it’s also expensive (and has alcohol). When I saw this amaretto flavored matcha, I wanted to try it to see how it compared. I got the Robust flavoring level, as always, and made this in my Matcha-Water bottle with ½ teaspoon for matcha and 16 oz. of water.

I have to say I am really impressed at this flavor. It does taste a LOT like an amaretto sour, except there’s no sugar and it’s not sickly sweet. I could add some sugar to this to sweeten it up, but I really don’t think it needs it. I don’t know if you’d necessarily be able to pick it out as amaretto, but knowing that’s what it tastes like I can definitely pick up the flavor.

I’ve also recently learned that amaretto is actually a combination of almonds and apricots. All the more reason it would make a nice fruity (but not overly sweet) drink.

If you love amaretto sours, or just amaretto, I would definitely recommend this. I wonder if anyone would be brave enough to mix this with some REAL amaretto.. LOL.

Get this matcha here: http://www.redleaftea.com/matcha-tea/amaretto-matcha.html

Thanks to Azzrian for a sample of this!

This is very tasty. It’s not as fruity as I would have liked, but it’s not too bitter, either. I don’t know if I’m getting a lot of sangria flavor, but I am getting some subtle fruity flavor. Azzrian put it best when she said it was a cross between citrus and red berries. It’s not absolutely repulsive, but I don’t know if anyone is going to say “Man, that’s definitely Sangria”

A good middle of the road matcha.

Thank you Teaves for this sample (I won it in a contest).

You can’t-a have-a de Mango!!

The first time I saw this tea, it seemed like a tea that needed to be cold-brewed. So the first time I cold-brewed it in the fridge, it didn’t go as planned. There was too much black tea base and not enough mango flavor. I put it away and didn’t try for a while.

Flash forward to a few weeks later when I dug this out and decided to try again. This time I used less leaf, and now the mango flavor really shines through. This is a delicious iced tea that doesn’t need any sweetener to get that mango flavor. I’m sure a little bit would make it pop, but for a calorie free treat this hits the spot.

Glad I finally got to cold brew this correctly.

Apologies for the backlogging. Steepster was down for a bit.

Anyway, my boyfriend actually won this tea from Della Terra Tea facebook contest, but I borrowed some anyway to see what it was all aobut. I enjoy a good pu-erh tea blend if it’s done right.

Even though the reviews of this are mixed, this is definitely a very good pu-erh blend. I’m getting chocolate notes and it blends well with the pu-erh base (which I can definitely taste). As the tea cools off, it’s enjoyable hot OR cold. I was expecting to have to add some milk to round this out but it didn’t need anything in my opinion. Maybe next time I’ll throw in just to see how it goes.

On the chai side, this does fall a little bit short, though. Which is fine by me since I’m not really a OMG SPICY CHAI person. However, if someone wanted chocolate pu-erh with a little kick? Eh, don’t expect to much. This probably could have benefited from more spices if that’s what they were going for.

It’s still very enjoyable, though, and definitely one of the best pu-erh blends I’ve tried.

Thanks to Zen Tea for the sample.

For the most part, I dig pu-erh blends. Definitely more than I dig Pu-erh, which often tastes like “blech” to me.

I really liked this blend. It’s definitely not my favorite pu-erh blend, but it’s not bad. Unlike the other reviewers, though, I didn’t get the strong pu-erh taste. I was definitely getting the mint and vanilla. It was a very nice tea that didn’t need anything extra added to it, even though the instructions recommended adding milk and sugar to it a la chai.

I would recommend this to someone who didn’t like pu-erh that much, but wanted to drink it anyway for the strong health benefits.