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Phew, what a night! I make my breakfast smoothies the night prior and store them in the fridge, and tonight while doing so the plastic of my blender caraffe cracked and red strawberry smoothie guts splattered all over my kitchen, looking very Halloween-horror-scene-appropriate. I, however, wasn’t quite so amused. Not only did I have to clean my kitchen, but I had to get dressed again, go back out after I’d settled in for the night, and buy a new blender stat to have my fruity matcha goodness in the morning. I am in the middle of an 11,000 book re-labeling project at work, and that was the last thing I needed to come home to!

So, no more drama for the night. Need relaxing tea! Had a few DAVIDsTEA caffeine-free samplers lying around — this one had coconut, so I immediately ripped it open and checked it to see if it was still steepable or would be trashed. Nibbled a slice of coconut. Tasted okay. Didn’t smell foul. Okay, will go with this one. Too tired to heat milk, so it’s just a plain ol’ hot cuppa.

The aroma smells very pleasant… definitely not that “instant badness” coconut smell I got from that Mighty Leaf Coconut Assam freebie teabag not long ago, but rich, sweet coconut, and lots of warming spices… cinnamon, cardamom, perhaps a hint of ginger and pepper peeking through on the nose as well? The flavor is very nice… The coconut adds a bit of sweetness to the spices, which just feel so warm and comforting tonight, and while the last rooibos I had from DAVIDsTEA (Pumpkin Cheesecake) tasted very medicinal/woody to me, this one does not; it’s very smooth and I’m getting more of a nutty/honeyed flavor from the base.

This is the sort of cuppa that helps make up for a shit night. Warm, comforting, relaxing.

I love pop/soda/cola-flavored teas, and not long ago finished off a bag of Gourmet Root Beer that was fantastic. I actually had the coveted rare large 50g bag of this tea, still unopened, from 2017, and as I’m trying to finish off all teas in my collection from that year, it got moved over to become my next focus tea for cold/iced brew.

I tend to prefer black teas brewed warm and then iced, so that is how I prepared this batch — I steeped 7g of tea in 2 cups 205F water for three minutes, strained, and then added an additional 2 cups cold water (and two teaspoons liquid sugar to help add to the pop factor) to the mason jar, let it cool on the counter for about 15 minutes, then put it in the fridge to chill overnight.

Mmm! While I don’t think I like this one quite as much as the Gourmet Root Beer, this is still a very solid pop-flavored tea. I’m getting a typical cola flavor (I think adding the bit of sweetener may have helped bring that to the forefront), followed by candied ginger and lime zest. I’m not able to make out notes from the base as distinctly with this one as I could with the root beer tea, either, but it is very smooth and refreshing! I’m definitely going to enjoy going through my bag.

Oof, this matcha has an overwhelmingly strong biting, artificial strawberry flavor to it. It may be a pretty pink color, but it has zero matcha/green tea flavor, and the berry flavor just feels like a punch in the face. I just got through a bag of Lupicia’s Matcha Au Lait Strawberry, which still had a nice, vegetal matcha flavor but a sweet “candy strawberry marshmallow” sort of flavor to it, and compared to that, this is just not really doing it for me. Even used in a berry smoothie, that artificial strawberry flavor overpowers everything — even the flavor of actual strawberries! (How???) If I use a very small amount of powder and use coconut milk for my latte it is slightly better, as the flavor of the coconut milk helps temper it a bit.

I really enjoyed T2’s Mint Chip matcha, but not a fan of this one. Hoping to get through my bag rather quickly…

I had tried cold brewing tea directly in milk once, and it ended very badly. Decided to give it another try using this tea. I used twice the amount of leaf that I would’ve used if I were brewing it with water, and left it steeping in the fridge in vanilla oat milk for at least 24 hours.

I feel the flavor still isn’t quite as strong as I’d prefer, but I am pleasantly surprised that I am getting a “biscuity” note from the tea. I really love McVities Dark Chocolate Digestive Biscuits, and while it isn’t particularly as chocolately as I’d like, I am actually tasting something (perhaps caused from the spices?) that is reminding me of that graham-like biscuit cookie. The milk smells very chocolately, and perhaps if I was using plain oat milk (which I never buy, as I like the sweetness from the vanilla kind!) it would’ve “popped” a little more. It is delightfully creamy and certainly easy to drink, but I plan to use it to make a chocolate raspberry smoothie.

Made as a plain cuppa, I’m surprised to find the milk actually wasn’t changing the flavor much for me. I’m still only getting a very mellow impression of chocolate, but a strong graham/biscuity note. There is a subtle cocoa presence to the flavor, but I’m still surprised how much this does taste like the hard biscuit cookie under the chocolate frosting of my McVities digestive biscuits. It’s a very nice Biscuit/Digestive tea, I am just not getting the chocolate part of “Chocolate Digestives”… but I guess that could be my complaint for a lot of teas. Even with cocoa shells (which this tea does have) it seems that chocolate flavor hides from me a lot!

I picked up this package of powdered Hojicha mix in a Mitsuwa in San Jose on a vacation once. Mixed up as a latte, I found it way too sweet (and I have quite the sweet tooth!) I notice that “beet sugar” is the first listed ingredient, so there just seems to be way too much sugar in this particular mix for even my tastes (and I don’t mind when my matcha mixes are pre-sweetened, in general). I tend to use sweeter types of non-dairy milk as well, which probably just exacerbated the problem.

So today I decided to make a milkshake out of it, since that is something my brain already expects to be extremely dessert-sweet, using Lactose-free vanilla ice cream (and just a bit of vanilla oat milk to help with the mixing). I do think I preferred it that way than as a straight latte — I think, if I ever made it as a latte again, I might have to “cut” it with a straight cup of hojicha to see if that balances it out a bit better… something to try in the future!

Will try to find other creative ways to get through this (rather large) bag and use it up, and then I will definitely look for a different brand of hojicha powder in the future.

A freebie teabag from the 2018 San Francisco International Tea Festival. I’m having a horrible migraine today and thought something like this would be fairly inoffensive since my GI goes cray-cray at the same time my head goes boom. I couldn’t rip open the outer package to the teabag and had to get the kitchen scissors, which cut the top off of the interior teabag, so I had to empty all the contents into one of my own fillable teabags, which was slighly more effort than I wanted to put forth while feeling like this, but meh. It was done and the tea was steeped.

I really just smell grapefruit and orange zest coming off the cup. That is mostly what I taste, too, but then, I’ve never had milk thistle and am not sure what it should taste like. The grapefruit is a lot lighter tasting than I usually get when it is used in teas, and I really like that (I’ve started to warm up to it as a flavor presense as of late, even though I don’t care for the plain fruit). It’s like there is a light, milky, slightly floral/herbaceous note that was tempering the grapefruit from being too abrasive, and it actually worked really well. If I was going to drink a grapefruit-flavored tea, I actually think this would be my choice. It’s coming off a little more as a generic citrus zest note, but very pleasant.

Ya… I dig this! Not something I’d ever think to try so I’m glad I got the chance to try it!

It just felt like an EG morning today. I had this single teabag that I grabbed from a freebie pile at the Portland Tea Expo in 2019 — I’ve always liked the Twinings of London bagged teas I’ve had (I particularly like their Lavender EG, but it isn’t sold in my local store) but realized I had never tried their bog-standard. Brewed it up this morning. Smells delightful. I feel like I’m getting a bit more of a lemon-lime aroma from the bergamot this morning, but I might just have limes on the brain because I had a Coconut Lime smoothie for breakfast.

It’s good. Some bagged EGs are too astringent/sour for me, but this one is nice and smooth, at least with my typical 3 minute steep time. The bergamot is pretty strong and the cup is quite citrusy in its flavor notes… I am tasting a bit of lemon, lime, and grapefruit, with the lemon/lime note being more noticable toward the beginning of the sip, and the grapefruit being more prominent toward the end of the sip and in the aftertaste. The berg is present enough that I can’t really make out specific notes of the black base, but it is malty, warm, holds the berg well, and very smooth without any astringency after the sip. There is a little bit of dryness left on the tongue, but that seems to be from the strong citrus flavors.

Could easily drink more of this.

Finally got into the tea record for this one… These 404 errors are getting more than a little annnoying…

This is a sample I got in a tea exchange a while ago from AJRimmer, thank you! My sister had to work this weekend in my town and was staying at my place, so I made us this tea to go with some pumpkin cake for dessert after dinner.

I really like the scent of the dry leaf in the bag… there is a strong pumpkin spice aroma (especially cinnamon), but also a cookie-like quality. I’m getting the same scent off the steep cup, except it isn’t as pleasant to me as the dry leaf… it feels somewhat artificial, like an autumn-scented Yankee candle. The flavor is definitely not as nice as the aroma. The rooibos is coming off quite overbearing here, and I’m getting that brassy/medicinal note that I very rarely taste from red rooibos, as well as a strong woody note. Of the pumpkin spices, I’m mostly just tasting a strong cinnamon presence, with perhaps a bit of allspice… and there is a subtle caramel note that I’m not sure if its from the rooibos or a flavoring. There may be a flavoring in here not meshing with me, as well… I think I’ll try it a few other ways to see if I can’t improve it over the straight cup (perhaps a latte with a little maple syrup added?)

I plan to finish off the sample, but this isn’t one I’m going to miss. I am always grateful for the opportunity to try a pumpkin tea I haven’t had before, so thanks again, AJ!

This was a free sampler I got while attending a tea blending presentation at the Portland Tea Expo 2019. It’s a simple mint rooibos blend, but that is precisely what felt like hitting the spot tonight.

Tastes how one would predict a mint rooibos blend would taste. It is very smooth, on account of the rooibos being blended with honeybush, so it is tending a little more nutty/honey with more subtle wood notes and just a touch of a vanilla taste, and the mint is Oregon spearmint, which might just be my favorite of all the mints, so it is refreshing, leaves a cooling sensation on the throat, without having an overwhelming hit of menthol.

Simple and satisfying.

Had some time before a doctor appointment today, so decided to get the little 180ml pumpkin pot out again and go through another of the old 2017 Dazzle Deer samplers. This time I’m taking on my least-liked tea-type, pu’erh. Though I admittedly have had much more experience with shou than sheng, so I wonder if I can get a different experience than the “dirt and marsh water” that I usually taste…

Used the full 7g sample and filled the pot to 140ml (so it wasn’t quite to its capacity) with 205F (lowered to 195F, and then 185F) water.

140ml miniature teapot | 7g | 205F (Dropped to 195F, 185F) | Rinse/10s/15s/10s/10s/10s/10s

The wet leaf after the rinse smells like wet autumn leaves, raisin, bitter melon, and sour vegetables. The first infusion has a surprisingly sweet/floral aroma!? As well as honey, and raisin and autumn leaf. I definitely have never had these kind of scents in a pu’erh before… and… it tastes good to me?! What the frack, this has a lightly floral (lilac? lotus?) taste, a touch of that fruity honeyed raisin quality, and then a slightly more bitter vegetal (cabbage?) finish. On the second infusion the tea had suddenly grown uncomfortably bitter (the description for the tea says it has “no bitterness or astringency” so I can’t help but feel like I’m doing something wrong?), so instead of increasing the steep times for each infusion like Dazzle Deer’s site had recommended, I decided to try sticking at the 10s and also lowered the water temp slightly to 195F. That helped some, but it still was a little more bitter/astringent than I prefer… What happened to that lovely first steep?! Lowering the water temperature even further (185F) helped a little, but I still felt an almost medicinal bitterness left afterwards on my tongue. Only by my sixth steep had it mellowed, but by then I was tired of the tea and ready to wrap up the session…

I think this is closer in flavor to something I would like (while I never seem to have much luck with shou, unless it is in flavored blends), if it weren’t for the bitterness that overtook the tea after the first steep. And I don’t know if that bitterness is a sheng problem or a Sara problem. Will need to explore further.