15695 Tasting Notes
Another matcha that I mixed with chia and cold water, as a “breakfast drink” of sorts. I actually really enjoyed this one – even though I was a touch heavy handed with the amount of matcha I used it had a lovely freshness and sweetness to it and both apple/pear flavours were really clear/vibrant/non-competitive. Some grassyness from the matcha itself, but it fit well with the orchard fruits. More of a “red apple” with that sweet, dewy quality than more tart green apple. Succulent. Maybe even a touch creamy from the pear!? Felt very much like a breakfast appropriate flavor.
Had this one sprinkled over popcorn last weekend during a binge of The Flash; and it was fine but also didn’t necessarily compliment the buttery popcorn SUPER well nor was it a strong flavour since I was a little light handed when I was adding it on as a topping…
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.
Picked up a bag of this from my trip to Camellia Sinensis last weekend, along with a few other things…
This was a pretty cool moment for me; I’ve been shopping at CS for year now and have spent probably over a thousand dollars there in tea and teaware. It’s one of my favourite tea stores of all time, and I am FINALLY living somewhere were I can actually go there and shop/smell the teas in person. It was a big “crossing it off the tea bucket list” type of moment for me!
This tea smelled amazing in store – insanely ripe and juicy apricot notes that just jump out at you. It’s really full bodied, really sweet, and very in your face. The steeped tea definitely isn’t quite so lively as that dry aroma, nor is it as sweet and well defined of a flavour. However, it does still taste like fresh, ripe apricots and is very smooth. Not overly sweet, really natural tasting and perfectly compliments the more floral leaning base oolong tea. I do wish it was a little juicier so as to better match the dry aroma, but all in all its a really pleasant flavor and probably one of the best apricot teas I’ve ever had. I bet it would be KILLER iced or cold brewed!
Sipdown (584)!
Another sipdown where I finished the tea off with some added in eggnog. ’Tis the season, I guess!? I really, really liked the addition of it here though because the rich, creamy/custardy sweet element of the eggnog really helped to smooth out and balance some of the course, smoky lapsang in this blend that can be a little bit choppy/rough and too savory. What was left with this sort of “smoked” eggnog brulee profile!? And it was pretty tasty!
Sipdown (585)!
Finished off with maple agave and eggnog, for one hell of a sweet and indulgent pancake breakfast type of profile. An almost festive, and Canadian leaning pancake breakfast if you will!? I enjoyed slowly sipping on this one while I did my cooking for the birthday party I went to last night.
So I made this after work, to drink on my commute home.
To be fair, while I have tried Japenese black tea before once or twice, I don’t know a lot of Japanese black tea nor do I have a strong familiarity with how it normally tastes. However, the few times I’ve had it I found it very flat and lifeless in terms of flavour, and really just not what I typically want out of a good black tea.
I didn’t dislike this one; but I also didn’t find it overly complex or enticing either and it’s not the flavor profile I would generally be really craving from a black tea. It was, however, better than any other Japanese Black Tea I’ve had in the past. For me, I found it very smooth and lacking any sort of tannin and astringency – almost to a fault, since that left the flavor profile very dull and didn’t add any depth/nuance to the flavour notes. I thought the initial aroma of the dry leaf/steeped tea and the first bit of each sip had a touch of a leather-y quality to them, and then the body was more like fruit cake to me. By that, I mean it had that sort of “generic fruit”/dried fruit taste, with just a little bit of cinnamon and that cake-y/molasses sort of taste that the cake part of fruit cake has. All of those notes being on the softer side, and pretty equal in terms of presence.
Hence, fruit cake.
It was a fine tea – but simple/lacking complexity. It would be a really good option for something smooth and relatively mindless to sip on while doing other things throughout the day.
Another cold brewed tea + chia mixture.
This one was honestly AMAZING; I wasn’t sure the spices would translate well with the chia in a cold form but it was actually so sweet and fruit, with a lot of the pineapple flavour coming out really prominently and accented by the natural sweetness of the carrot in the tea. The turmeric/ginger combo was actually super subtle in terms of flavour and mostly added a bit of depth to the sweetness, and a little warmth in the finish. I’d TOTALLY make this as a chia beverage again!
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.
I had to stop by a retail store last week to pick up some tins (including the cute seal tin), and I grabbed something o drink while I was there too because that’s kind of just what you do. I had been craving this tea literally all day but I don’t own any of it so it was a great chance for me to get it and satisfy that craving. I had it as a latte, and it was really satisfying. Not for the coffee notes, mind you. Though, coffee and steamed milk obvious does go together very nicely and anything coffee usually works well as a latte. No, it was the cardamom that I was DEEPLY craving – that spice is so comforting and cozy, with a nice natural sweetness to it.
Still don’t love this enough to buy it – but I love being able to so easily scratch that cravings itch.
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.
Had this one Gong Fu, last weekend I think?
I don’t remember a whole lot about the session apart from just being really into the flavour profile of the tea as a whole. I mean, I distinctly remember thinking how phenomenally this tea had developed over time (much brighter, and fruitier) and getting very hyped about trying this year’s version and watching it do the same over time.
Though looking at instagram, it appears that I found the taste sweet, floral, and jammy. I also wrote down, in my notes, that I steeped this eight times throughout the session.
So there’s that.
Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/BrI1HILlMIw/
Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVxR-jxL7C4
I don’t know if you can necessarily “cold brew” a matcha since it’s a powder that infuses pretty instantly when whisked/stirred into what liquid you’re using (water, milk, etc.) but I guess this was KIND OF cold brewed?
Basically I whisked it into a glass of water and chia that hadn’t “gelled up” yet and left it overnight in the fridge while the chia did its thing and hydrated, or whatever you want to call it. So this was cold matcha + chia. It tasted really nice; pleasantly smooth cocoa notes. However, because of the charcoal I think, there was a strong and distinct grittiness to the texture that was off putting. I generally think of chia as very smooth so having a gritty chia drink was… a no go.
