So far its been a black tea day, so I think after this one I might switch it up a little bit: maybe an oolong? Anyway, I threw this in with my first Butiki order – though I don’t have the slightest idea what about it was compelling me. It’s not like I had particularly thought to myself “Hmmm, what does my stash need? Oh, I know! Carrot tea!”. It’s interesting because I seem to be acquiring several blends with carrot in them (Pink Flamingo, Pumpkin Chai, A Rabbit’s Garden…) – although this is the only one that particularly boasts carrot as a main flavour, so I am interested to try it out. Plus I think it being limited edition had something to do with it as well.
Dry, the smell is really interesting: not madly compelling but not unsettling or off putting either. I don’t know if this will make sense, but it’s the first comparison that came to mind. In addition to the smell of carrot and light notes of vanilla, this smells like dirt. But, good dirt – in fact the best dirt! Somehow, in the dry smell, I’m getting the smell of the dirt in a garden right after a good spring or early summer rain. Does this make sense? It’s fresh, after rain dirt smell when everything is calm and tranquil: like right after a really big thunder and lightning storm. I love that smell…
I steeped 1 level tsp. for 10 oz. of boiling water for three minutes. As I’m drinking it now, I’m thinking I probably should have stuck with 8 oz. like recommended, but I’ve been using a 10 oz. mug all day and I didn’t really feel like dirtying another mug, especially since it’s my turn to do dishes next… If it was Tre’s turn, well that’s another story.
Actually, speaking of Tre he’s hovering over me right now watching my write my review which is a little disconcerting, not gonna lie. He’s waiting for me to go back to watching Day of The Doctor (which I caved in to watching because of his pushing me to do so) – but I told him writing my review as I was drinking the tea was more important. He’s also decided that DAVIDsTEA’s Salted Caramel is his new favourite tea, which is good because I have about 60g of it, and also bad because it’s one I enjoy too and if he treats it like he did DAVIDsTEA’s Red Velvet Cake (which I thankfully despised) that 60g will be gone in less than a month.
Taste wise, first thing I get from this tea is the spice. It’s not exactly gentle, but it’s not a spice overload either and I like that. It’s rare you find a spiced tea that is a nice, happy medium between the two flavours. Then I get the carrot – and again I’m really quite enjoying that. Similar to how I get a “fresh dirt” smell from the leaf, the carrot tastes like the carrots fresh from my Grandma’s garden back when she was well enough to tend to one. My cousins and I used to pull the up from the ground when we were little and eat them before properly washing them: we’d just smudge the dirt off as best we could and chow down, and somehow despite being still kinda covered in dirt they tasted fresh and delicious. Best carrots ever! And this is sort of like that.
I didn’t get much vanilla at all until I had allowed my mug to cool down a fair bit, much to Tre’s annoyance. He’s just sitting here impatiently while I watch my mug for a couple minutes (partially I did this just to piss him off, because I’m such a good roommate).
“Why does it take so long to just write down that it tastes good!?”
“Because there’s a process to it! Sometimes different flavours are more apparent at different temperatures – I don’t judge you when you take an hour to design your character for an RPG you’ll probably never play again!”
Anyway, at a cooler temperature, I do get more of the vanilla (which is nice with the carrot, and I’m finding weird with the spice) and a touch of the “cake” – which is only really present for me here, and I’m finding myself impartial to. I could do without it and not be heavily disappointed.
Overall, I enjoy this cup a pretty good deal but despite it having a lot of really good qualities I don’t think I’m in love with it, and I’m not about to go out of my way to stockpile more of it before it disappears from the Butiki site, whenever that happens to be. I’m pretty sure what I have of it will be enough for my to keep experiencing it for a while and then move on.
