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Feeling incredibly stressed today. Thesis is progressing, but so slowly. Going to miss the deadline of next Friday. And I have so much other stuff to do as well… I need clothes for Mexico, and to pack up my stuff since I’m moving once I get home from my travels. Ugh. Can this be March again, please?

Since I enjoyed this one with milk so much a few days ago, I decided to brew up a big mug of it since I’m being indulgent and don’t particularly care if I’m drinking something that’s doctored, as long as it tastes good. Result? Delicious, though I wish it was a bit stronger. Should have left the infuser basket in longer.

Finally brewing some of this up. It certainly reminds me of Premium Taiwanese Assam, with some fruity raisiny notes, but there’s also a bit of hay in here, instead of chocolate. I don’t have time to check other people’s tasting notes, but I have to imagine that others felt similarly?

I do get the leafhopper notes, which is what’s coming off as raisiny/fruity to me – they’re less pronounced IMO than in Gui Fei or Mi Xian, which is fine; I probably like this tea better for it.

Anyhow, I still think I prefer PTA because of the chocolate, but I’ll have to refresh my memory once I get ahold of my bazillion ounces that’s currently waiting for me a couple provinces away.

ETA: Second infusion, less water, accidentally untimed infusion length. Still tasty, and I’m getting more of the leafhopper notes and less sweetness (it’s present in the aroma, not really the flavour). I preferred the first infusion. The lack of sweetness almost gives it a bit of a cardboardy flavour, which is a bit odd.

Tastes like I underleafed this one tonight, sigh. Still good flavours, just weaker than I would like. I should have knocked some sugar into this cup too!

ETA: Sweetened my re-infusion, and it was delicious. Perhaps I’ll have a properly sweetened first infusion tonight! (Who am I kidding, I’m going to forget all about this and do the same thing next time I have it. And the following time. So forgetful.)

Well, I didn’t catch the popping of the pop rocks (but wasn’t listening for it)… Anyways, this tastes a lot like Glitter & Gold from DavidsTea. Sweet, and a similar sort of cinnamon. Lately I’ve had an aversion to cinnamon teas though, so this is not my favourite cup. Unfortunately, I also still have another cup’s worth left. Sigh. I’m only drinking this tonight because my stomach didn’t roil when I looked at the little packet. On the plus side, this tea does taste pretty good, so for anyone reading this, my review is definitely an “it’s not you, it’s me” sort of deal :)

Cold brew! Again, lightly sweetened (as in, you really can’t even tell that it’s sweet, it’s just not as “dry”) which makes it perfect.

Clearly overleafed this one tonight, so added milk and sweetened… delicious! The tastiness of the tea itself is not overpowered, which is really awesome. I may drink the rest of it like this.

Final April Amoda Tea Box tea. This matcha is pre-sweetened, which works for lazy me; otherwise I probably wouldn’t have tried it until another day. Laziness, etc.

Anyhow, the matcha smells somewhat peachy, but it’s not a terribly authentic flavour. I haven’t had peach-flavoured matcha from Red Leaf, although I do recall it garnering some less-than-stellar reviews due to tasting a bit chemically. This one perhaps leans a bit toward chemically/flavouring-esque smells, but isn’t too bad.

I used probably about 1.5 tsp of the powder for 8oz. of water, and just stirred it in… if there are clumps, I don’t care a great deal. Less clumpy than my lattes usually are, anyhow.

So yes. This tea is definitely sweet. My initial thought was “too sweet”, but now that I’ve had a few sips, I think the sweet is needed to mask some of the matcha bitterness. Yeah, this stuff is kind of bitter, underneath the flavouring. To be honest though, I haven’t ever had matcha in non-latte form to my knowledge, so perhaps this is just how it is supposed to be.

Anyhow, I’m not really getting peach at all here, just a sweetened cup of tea with some bitterness and “matcha flavour”, plus some sort of vague fruitiness that I can’t place. Kind of unfortunate. I think I’ll try this one as a latte sometime later; perhaps that will reduce the bitterness and astringency I’m tasting. I may also drop the water temp and see if that helps.

Oh well, interesting to try regardless!

Second tea from the April Amoda Tea Box.

Like Cavocorax, I’m not the hugest fan of earl greys. Without cream, that is :P That’s how I drank my Tetley EG with my oldest friend way back when (plus unbelievable amounts of sugar), and I loved it. Still holds a place in my heart, as do the earl grey creams that I’ve recently discovered I like, but this one? Has no cream. And a lot of lemongrass, which is hit or miss for me. So, I’m a bit apprehensive.

The aroma is reminiscent of, but not quite like earl greys that I’m used to. Definitely more citrus, particularly lemon, and less bergamot, as was mentioned in the tea description. I only gave this a ~2.5 minute infusion to make sure the base stayed drinkable without additions, which worked fairly well. The flavor is lemony with a background of bergamot and a solid but unremarkable black tea base. The lemon here is toeing the line of tasting cleaner-y, but isn’t quite there, which is good, but consequently I’m not super sure I like it. I am noticing, as Cavocorax also did, that there does seem to be a sort of creaminess at the end of the sip, but it’s not quite enough for me :P

Anyways, I think this one would be better sweetened and with milk. It’s not a bad EG at all, and for those who love EGs and lemongrass, it would probably be a big hit! I, however, would like a big dose of cream in here to bring it more into line with my preferences.

ETA: I did re-infuse this one, and it was alright. Drank it too quickly to notice a great deal about it, except that there was still flavour. I preferred the first infusion, but perhaps #2 would be just fine with additions.

First tea from my April Amoda Tea Box! Just fetched it from the ice/icicle-coated mailbox. Man, is it ever looking to get nasty out there… There have been weather advisories since Tuesday about a wicked winter ice storm headed our way, and it looks to hit fully later tonight (personally, I’m hoping that the power goes out and stays out for like, 5 days. Because then I could justify doing everything else other than writing my thesis…)

Now this tea smells much more like I would have expected DavidsTea’s Forever Nuts to smell like. Dry, the tea smells strongly of various nuts (primarily almond) and a bit like amaretto as well. Steeped, some cinnamon wafts into the aroma, which is not unexpected but perhaps not quite what I was wanting, since the almondy/amaretto combination from the dry tea was what I was really after.

Thankfully, flavourwise, this does taste fairly nutty, to me, and not as fruity as Forever Nuts in spite of the addition of apple pieces (which I think are only serving to prevent this from being a dry nut mouth catastrophe!) The cinnamon is also just a background note, as is the amaretto, for the most part. I’m actually rather enjoying this! I overleafed according to the instructions (I probably used 2tsp for 8 oz.) and I wouldn’t want it any weaker, though it’s perfect as is.

I feel like this tastes similar to a tea I had from DavidsTea that I commented would more aptly fit the name “Forever Nuts”… something is telling me that was Hot Toboggan, but I’m pretty sure that’s not right. Anyways! I like this tea :D Not so apple cidery is a big bonus :)

ETA: I enjoyed my second infusion of this one as well, in half the water. And then proceeded to eat the nuts from the infuser :D Interesting experience! Will repeat.

Sipdown, 782. Thanks to Nina’s Paris for a sample of this tea :)

I couldn’t remember what the flavouring was supposed to be in this tea, and a sniff of it made me think apple… but apparently I’m wrong, as it’s strawberry. Knowing that and sniffing, however, makes it clear that it is strawberry (even though I’m pretty sure you could still convince me that it’s sweet apple!)

Anyhow, this isn’t too bad of a tea. A 2-minute infusion kept the base in check, and there’s a good dose of apple (strawberry) flavouring, which is quite nice. Overall, a fairly tasty fruity black, not my first choice of tea type but better than some I’ve tried!