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So, it’s the first day of Autumn today!

I’m celebrating/getting into the Autumn spirit by wearing the biggest, coziest sweater I own and curling up under the covers with pumpkin teas – nothing says “Fall” more than that except for, perhaps, the crab apples tree just outside my window that’s beautifully transitioning from bright green leaves to crisp, warming yellows and oranges accented by the bright red crab apples covering the whole thing.

So; this is my first Pumpkin Chai of the year – and possibly my last. I just don’t really love Chai tea, and to be honest I find this one a little bit overhyped. It’s just a little too much spice for me, with not enough sweet, rich pumpkin pay off. I’ve kind of found a way to rectify that this year though: I’ve added in a nice squeeze of pumpkin agave to both boost the pumpkin flavour in the tea and give it more sweetness/dessert like qualities so that it’s a little more in line with what I want out of a pumpkin/autumnal Chai.

It’s still got lots of warming cinnamon notes, don’t get me wrong! And the black tea is nice and rich/full bodied and adds a nice layer of malt to the warming cinnamon elements. It’s just that it’s got a brighter pumpkin flavour, and the caramel/burnt sugar notes are a little more exaggerated thanks to the extra sweetness of the agave.

Oh! I also topped it off with a scoop of vanilla ice cream! That way the mug cooled down a little faster, and I got to sip the tea through the melted down ice cream foam, which made it even creamier/silkier and kind of replicated the feeling/taste of eating pumpkin pie with whipped cream on top. Only thing that would have made it better would have been a pinch of nutmeg sprinkled on top.

Happy first day of Autumn!

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

Sipdown (339)!

Anytime you have to say goodbye to a fandom tea is sad, but this is one of the oldest teas in my cupboard so having finished it off feels pretty satisfying/like a solid accomplishment. This certainly wasn’t just a straight forward hot cup either; for this one I finished it off as an iced latte, sweetened with pumpkin agave. Let me just get it out of the way now, it was magical – and not just because this is a Harry Potter themed tea.

As always, this was rich and sweet with a great mix of nutty flavours: almond, hazelnut, and peanut! It’s undercut with caramel sweetness, so it just kind of bonds all those different nutty elements together to create this rich overall flavour. The milk from the latte makes it creamier and silkier, and the flavour comes together in a way that reminds me of the sweet, creamy and nutty nougat in an Oh Henry! bar; though obviously without any trace of chocolate (as it should be). Icing it just makes it more refreshing.

The pumpkin was the crown jewel though: it was just like this lovely autumnal flavour that really added a sweet, dessert like element without taking anything away from the flavours that were already there. Plus, with all that creamyness and nutty flavour, it was SORT OF pumpkin pie like, with fresh whipped cream and everything! Just no spices. And who needs the spices, really? Pumpkin is better when it’s creamy and on its own.

I think this was the best possible thing I could have done with the tea leaf to finish it off!

Sipdown (340)!

Made this one in my tea press, and this time I’m doing it iced just to see how the flavour differs from trying it hot. Mostly, I think it’s the same: a very sweet, juicy berry flavour. I find it a bit less tart overall, but that makes sense given that it’s an iced tea over a hot tea; in general that iced style of prep tends to soothe tartness or at least take a bit of the edge off it. The berry flavour is pretty straight forward blackberry, but has some elderberry and raspberry kind of elements to it too. I think I find it sweeter overall than I did as a hot tea; maybe even on the cusp of being a little too sweet? I know the blackberry leaf is responsible for A LOT of that intensity and sweetness, but something else reminds me faintly of icing sugar too and I can’t totally place what it is. The whole profile is undercut with the faintest, softest herbaceous element. Again, probably the blackberry leaf.

I liked this one overall; both as a hot tea and an iced tea. I do think the iced version was maybe just a little too sweet, so I think I’d opt for drinking it hot if I were to revisit it in the future.

Cold Brew Sipdown (341)!

So, Story of Me Tea recently had a thing where they’d send you three free cold brew/iced tea samples for just the cost of shipping – and after browsing the site I saw three teas that interested me enough to try it out.

What drew me to this one was that it’s essentially just a straight rhubarb flavoured tea. You really don’t see a lot of those, and I like rhubarb a lot so anything that leans really heavily into that flavour is something I can probably get on board with. When I cracked open the sealed packet I saw that the tea is premeasured out to be made into ice tea inside of a “teabag”, although the leaf itself is still whole loose leaf and not anything like dust/fannings. It smelled incredible too; a very, very bright and sweet jammy rhubarb taste.

Now that I’ve strained it and am sipping on it now, I’m enjoying overall for the most part. The top notes and body are very rhubarb heavy; it’s sweet and tart, and comes off like real, natural rhubarb fruit that’s almost been made into a sort of jam or preserve. There’s also a bit of butteryness and roasty notes from the oolong base. If I had been able to leave the flavour just at that, it would have been totally lovely and delicious. Unfortunately, that’s not where things ended though…

The finish of this one is so incredibly sharp and sour; it’s grassy in all the ways that a tea shouldn’t be grassy. Just harsh, and piercing and unpleasant and unfortunately very long lasting/lingering into the aftertaste. It completely ruined the lovely rhubarb flavour, and left me feeling almost nauseous with just how intense it was overall.

And now I don’t even have the rest of the pitcher to try and tinker with the find a way to make it work because I set the pitcher down on the kitchen island and one of our cats jumped up and knocked the whole thing over. I guess he wasn’t a fan of it either…

So, I’m finishing my glass of this one feeling like this started off with so much promise but ultimately feeling pretty let down by what I ended up getting. I’d probably try it again and just experiment with the brew time, but only if I didn’t have to pay to do so. Personally, with how awful that sour grassy flavour was I can’t see myself at all spending money to possibly just recreate the same thing.

What a shame.

Hot tea from yesterday.

I remember this one being a lot richer the last time I had it as opposed to this time around; it was very light bodied, and I know that it wasn’t underleaf and it got a pretty standard steep as far as herbals go…

I mean, the orange was tasty and I got some nice, but very light, cardamom notes so the combination there was pretty solid. Where was the chocolate, though!? The whole sip I felt like the chocolate notes that were present were an aftertaste. Like, the main flavour had already passed, and this was just the shadow that remained. Of course, that meant that the actual aftertaste was pretty well nothing. Just a full stop, flavour wise.

I wanted to find this sweet, enjoyable and relaxing but mostly this time around I just found it to be pretty bland.

So, I work right across from Cookies By George which, on one hand, is lovely because it means popping over super conveniently for either bagels or cookies and other great treats. On the other hand, it’s probably not the best for my wallet…

The other day I grabbed at Italian Soda; usually I go for Raspberry but I was feeling something different today so I let him pick for me and low and behold I got this weird “Berry Tea” flavour. I think it’s a mix of a berry syrup and green tea, with the normal club soda and whipped cream topping. It was really good though! I mean, it probably only counts as tea in the loosest term possible but I found it REALLY refreshing and the mixed berry sort of flavour was very satisfying: strawberry, raspberry, blueberry…

A bit of all the ‘main’ berries, really!

It might just replace my go to choice of raspberry…

Sipdown (342)!

Thanks again for this tea VariaTEA!

This time around I tried it with some milk, and sipped on it on the ride home from work. It’s was pretty cold, so the warmth of the tea is honestly probably what I appreciated more than anything else. It’s weird though, ‘cause it was almost like a completely different tea flavour wise than the last time I’d had it…

- VERY STRONG creamy hazelnut
- With LIGHT milk chocolate notes
- Borderline Nutella like?
- Whipped cream notes in the undertones
- Somewhat watered down though overall

Sipdown (343)!

Thank you VariaTEA for sending this one my way! I was interested to try it for sure; anything with caramel typically catches my eye, and I’m not one to shy away from caffeine either!

I made this one hot, and then added a fair bit of milk to it as well. The flavour was really nice and smooth; obviously sweet caramel notes, but also the sweetness of like condensed milk which I’m sure was exaggerated by my addition of milk in the first place . The mate base was very roasty, which almost made it just a little coffee like, as well as toasty and nutty. It was a really nice compliment to the overall caramel sweetness.

This wasn’t really anything fancy, and I’ve definitely tried similar teas before too – but I enjoyed it a lot for what it was and I’m thankful I got to try it!

I feel like I’ve had this one in my cupboard for a long time; and I feel bad that I just haven’t gotten around to trying it. In fact, I probably would have continued to take ages trying it were it not for the fact that I let my little sister pick my final tea out for the night.

This was obviously what she picked; I think it’s the first time ever she’s gone for a tea that wasn’t flavoured. I’m almost 100% positive the deciding factor was the smoking monkey on the packaging. Now, I probably would have preferred to try this one Gong Fu but it’s just too late at night now to get into a Gong Fu session/commit to that much tea consumption. Plus, like I said, I’ve put off trying this one for so long now that even if it IS Western style, at least I’m finally trying this one!

So, here are my jot notes from the cup:

- I did forget to do a rinse; I’m just not in the habit of doing one with Western teas…
- Lighter in flavour than expected and very fragrant
- Thick mouthfeel and medium bodied flavour
- Body notes: apricot, peach skins, raisins, fresh clipped grass, and peat/moss
- It’s surprisingly sweet and bright!
- Top notes: raisins or craisins? Something sort of in that vein…
- Finish reminds me of lemon peel/zest; just a HINT pithy
- Also a bit herbeceous, especially in the aftertaste: almost a thyme like flavour?
- And then overall there’s just a very mineral/wet rock kind of undertone

I don’t know that it would be fair to say that I really enjoyed this one; but it was a lot better than I’d kind of expected it to be. To be completely fair, Raw Pu’erh just generally isn’t my thing – I much prefer ripe. I’ve noticed though that Yiwu pu’erh is probably as close an exception to that rule as I’ve gotten though: they’re generally fruitier and I can handle that kind of profile much better than I can other sort of Shengs.

I will try this one Gong Fu – but it may take a while for that to happen. At least, in the mean time, I can say that I have at least tried it in general.

Made in the tea press, with some milk.

The other day I went to the fancy/artisan candy store here in town and I bought some bulk rhubarb and custard hard candies important from the UK; I have to say that this tea tastes exactly like those candies! Sweet, rich custard and tart, bright rhubarb notes! So much rhubarb, too! Just, like, bursting with rhubarb!!!

Plus, these have the added bonus of not leaving my tongue sore/cracked from all the citric acid like the hard candies do…

I mean, I guess I shouldn’t be so surprised at the authenticity of the flavour: I’ve always thought this tea does the rhubarb notes in it really well and it does actually come from UK as well, so…

I just wish I liked more teas from Bluebird Tea Co. so that I could justify reordering this one again when I inevitably run out of it. ‘Cause, you know, that’s gonna happen sooner or later. Probably sooner.