16343 Tasting Notes
Backlog from this morning! I had a busy day today and am only now getting home after leaving the house at around two today. I brought this with me for my job interview (at Fuddruckers), to kind of keep me awake.
I made it as an iced/cold tea using my usual method (steep one extra strong cup and then do a second steep that usually tastes more watery, resulting in an average taste). This was my first time drinking this one iced, and I really liked it as an iced/cold tea. I feel like the chocolate, raspberry, and chicory flavours were more enhanced than usual and the taste of the almond and mate were more muted.
I think my job interview went well, but I don’t want to be cocky about it and therefore jinx it. If I DO get the job though, I’ll be working hours ranging from 6:30 AM until 5:00 PM which is REALLY early for me, especially in comparison to what I’m used to. The guy who did my interview was pretty cool – we actually ended talking about tea and whether tea is better than coffee (it totally is). He said he’s an Earl Grey fan, and his friends are green tea fans even though he hates green tea (something we have in common).
At the university, I went to an event called Queers and Ladders with Robyn, which was pretty fun. Basically, it was a games night for LGBTQ and allies and it was really cool meeting new people, especially since I know so few here in Saskatoon. They’re doing a movie night tomorrow and showing a movie/documentary called “Call Me Kuchu” (anyone know of it?) about the first openly gay man in Uganda. I think I’m gonna go tomorrow with Robyn again, so looking forward to that.
I also gave the rest of my White Peony sample from Teavivre to Robyn today, so I guess I can remove that one from my cupboard.
Woke up today with the most killer migraine, so going through my “migraine routine”. I steeped myself an extra strong cup of peppermint tea, and portioned myself a half cup of peanut butter. Peppermint tea and peanut butter almost always help my migraines go away.
I’ve also isolated myself in my room with the lights out and some corny romantic comedies at very low volume. I’m hoping this headache goes away by tomorrow since I have another job interview.
Fingers crossed I do well!
First time I had this one there was a funny soap taste to it, but I’m now convinced that must have been a result of either Tre or I not properly rinsing off our dishes and getting dish soap in the cup because I’ve had this a few times since and the soapy taste hasn’t made a reappearance.
Tonight I’m really getting strong notes of blueberry and elderberry and it’s not nearly as sweet as previous cups I’ve had which I’m going to attribute to having less stevia in the dry leaf I measured out. It’s really good regardless of whether it’s sweet from the stevia or not.
I think I have to bump the rating up on this one!
EDIT: Actually got a good second steeping out of this one! The flavour was less complex, but the blueberry and elderberry notes still came through quite clearly.
Preparation
I love this tea so much. I don’t know if I can pick a single tea as my favourite, but this is definitely in my top fives favourites and is by far my favourite white tea (although, I’ve recently discovered that I love many white teas). This tea alone can halt any cravings I have for junk food or sweets.
According to Tea Desire’s steeping instructions, you should use 2 tsp. of this and typically I have (and it’s be orgasmic). However, since I drink this one so often I don’t want to blow through all the leaf I have super quickly, so I decided to use less leaf this time and see if I could produce a tea that’s still great but, in doing so, average out more cups per 50g.
I steeped 1 1/2 tsp for 4 minutes, and the answer is… Yes! This tea is still JUST as yummy and flavourful, so I think I’ll be using 1/2 tsp. for each cup from now on. Yay for be stingy with my tea leaves!
Also, I think JUST MAYBE I have this whole internet issues thing figured out… I seem to not lose my connection when I stay in the laundry room, which happens to be the same room as the modem. As soon as I leave the laundry room I go back to the same issues I’ve been having where I disconnect every two or three minutes. So I’ve done the logical thing, of course, and set up my laptop on top of the dryer with a chair next to it and turned that into my desk.
If I can’t make the connection come to me, I guess I’ll come to the connection.
Preparation
Resteeped.
Right now, this is perfectly complementing the spicy beef Hamburger Helper I’m eating. The spices go together, but the apricot is something sweet and much more contrasting in flavour. I think the contrasting flavours in the tea alone are such a huge part of why I love this chai.
This second steep has really brought out the taste of cloves.
I love dessert teas so much, and they’re so good for curbing cravings for junk food. For example, I’m craving chocolate pastry right now or strawberry eggos. This just happens to be the perfect tea to combat those cravings.
Out of the tsp. and a half I measure out, there were quite a few massive chunks of strawberry (at least one was dime sized), so I’m anticipating a pretty fruity cup, at least in comparison to how this one normally tastes. The smell of it steeping is definitely dark chocolate and a huge blast of strawberry. Yum!
Yeah, definitely extra strawberry tasting! I added a wee touch of milk, mostly just to help cool it down faster. Still, it definitely adds more of a “milk chocolate” taste as opposed to the dark chocolate notes usually present. Tre was making fun of me for drinking a tea called “Love Tea”, so I just pointed out how pathetic he is for pining over a girl who, firstly, isn’t single and, secondly, he’s only known for like a week and a half. That shut him up pretty quickly.
Yeah, I’m such a nice roommate. He seems extra cranky today, and he keeps poorly imitating Australian people and making fun of my somewhat OCD organizational system for my teas. I don’t know, I’m probably just extra cranky from not eating anything today, and from how shitty the job hunt has been going. I wasn’t even able to apply anywhere new today because there weren’t any new listings on any of the job boards I use.
I’m just gonna try and relax and enjoy this sweet tea. Mmm…
Preparation
Dry leaf stills smells delicious, and still SO much like the sweet and sour sauce from the vegetarian meatballs we made in class (see my previous note on this tea for a better description). Mmm, sweet apricot jelly and a tangy sort of ketchup smell. Dang it’s really making me want actual food.
The smell of this one steeping is extra smokey today with strong contributing notes of apricot, cinnamon, cloves, and ketchup. I swear, I’m the only person who has review this tea to taste ketchup notes in it. I think it’s a huge part of why I love this so much, though.
1 heaping tsp. steeped for about 2 1/2 min. – the liquor is a cloudy orange colour. The taste is a balance of sweet, tangy, and spicy like always. I think I taste the ginger more than usual, and I’m wishing the the apricot and ketchup notes tasted closer to how strong they smell. Still, this is the perfect tea the help ward of hunger, at the moment.
Preparation
Ok, time to try this one again.
I’m still finding this pretty bitter, but I think I’m able to identify the taste a bit better. There are slight floral notes, and I want to say something verging on apricot or peach but just not quite getting there. It reminds me a lot of Ontario Ice Wine, but without the berry notes and with much more astringency.
The aftertaste isn’t sitting well with me at all, and I don’t think I can blame it on user error this time. I guess this is sort of a sip down then: I’ll be giving the last bit of this sample to Robyn.
Preparation
I’m sorry for this tea you tasted bitter. Would you please tell me the details about brewing? Such as the water temperature, how many tea leaves and water? Did you brewed this tea a little long?
I used 2 tsp. of tea for 6 oz. of water steeped in 88 degree celsius water for 1 minute. It did taste better than the first time I tried brewing it, but not by a lot.
Thanks for your information. We have brewed this tea again with 3 tsp (about 2g), 175ML water steeped in 88 degree for 1m30s. But we didn’t taste bitter. So i wonder if this tea you have brewed was Organic White Peony (Bai Mu Dan) Tea? It will be appreciate you can send me the picture about this tea. By the way, have you eaten something before you drink this tea ( sometimes it will affect the taste)? And how to save this tea?
Look forward to your reply.
The tea is being kept in an airtight container, in a drawer so that it doesn’t have any light exposure. I’m unable to upload a picture because of the internet connectivity issues I’ve been having for the last few days, but the leaf I recieved in my sample packet looks practically identical to the leaf depicted on the Steepster page for this tea, so I’m pretty sure I am drinking the Organic white Peony. It’s possible that this tea just simply isn’t to my taste – I did compare it to another white tea (albeit a flavoured one) I own which I am also not too fond of (a tea called Ontario Ice Wine). The tea I compared it to uses Bai Mu Dan as the base tea. But I greatly appreciate the length you seem to have gone to in order to help me enjoy this tea as much as possible. I think, however, that I’m going to give the remainder of my sample to a friend who enjoys straight white teas more than I do; that way it will be better appreciated.
Thanks for your information. I’m sorry our Organic White Peony (Bai Mu Dan) Tea is not your favorite tea. However, i also want to send you our fresh Organic White Peony (Bai MuDan) Tea as well as Organic Nonpareil Silver Needle White Tea (Bai Hao Yin Zhen). So you can try them and compare with the first Organic White Peony (Bai MuDan) Tea. Meanwhile, if you are interested in any kinds of tea sample, please don’t hesitate to tell me. I’m glad to provide for you.
If you want to try any kinds of tea sample, please don’t hesitate to send me your shipping address to: info@teavivre.com
Kind of “meh” second steeping. Mostly just tastes like cinnamon water, with maybe a bit of peppercorn taste.
It’s getting harder to not eat any food for my “tea cleanse weekend”. Tre ordered Chinese food, and bought me some vegetable fried rice (which was very nice of him) that just smells delicious, but I’m trying so hard not to cave and eat it.
I’ve had internet for a whole ten minutes! I think that’s the most I’ve had all day…
It’s really cold in the basement right now, so I decided I needed something to warm me up, and I was sort of feeling like berries would be the way to go.
Picked this tea, but remember to add a teaspoon of sugar. The sugar really brings out the berry notes in the tea, and does a decent job of eliminating the bitterness of it. I’ve experimented with different steep times, and I just can’t find a balance where I don’t get at least a little bitterness. There’s also some astringency and the sugar doesn’t really do anything for getting rid of that.
Had a second steep that was about the same. I could have gotten a third steep out of the leaves, but I wasn’t really feeling a third cup. Overall, tasted better than I remembered but I still hate that this one needs sugar to taste good.
Jinxing sure does seem real, doesn’t it? I swear the very few times in my life when I actually felt confident about getting a job, it didn’t happen, and vice versa. What is with that?
Those are crappy hours, though. I once had a job that started at 6am, so I had to get up by 4:30. Shudder.
But I’ll still cross my fingers for you!
Good luck! Those are tough hours, but I’m sure you’d get used to it fairly quickly. I never thought I could start work at 7 and I managed. Managed well enough at least.