Carävan

Backlogging. 11 days ago. Wednesday morning.

I’ve been reading about people blending two teas to create the smokey cowboy earl grey. But I’ve put off trying it even though I was intrigued. I did this as a half and half with Harney’s Earl Grey and this tea was all I could taste. The resteep was odd and not all that enjoyable.

2nd steep: 6 mins

Still watering the garden. I planted 5 different varieties of Sweet Potatoes this year. Some of them are showing great signed on productivity! Others don’t appear to be all that robust. No matter, I’ll enjoy whatever I get. I’m hoping the first frost takes it’s sweet time, to give them as long as possible to grow. This is the biggest sweet potato crop I’ve ever planted, & I’ve been thinking recently that I really need to figure out where I’m going to store them all this winter, because I could really end up with ALOT of sweet potatoes (which is a good thing, I eat one almost every day, they are SO good).

Breakfast was leftover fajitas from last night, with an egg on top, & a pot of this tea. It seemed like a good pairing for something spicy, & it was! Rich & smokey, a little sweet, & rather bold. A very big contrast from the purple tea gongfu session. I will say that it is tasting kind of woody to me today, but I probably over-tea-ed a bit, while I’m doing all this multi-tasking.

My first cooking project of the day is well underway: slow roasted tomatoes. I’m using a mix of Italian paste, & my beloved San Marzanos, drizzled with olive oil & salt. They’ll be in the over at 300 for about the next 3 hours or so. Now back to the garden.

Since Steepster is featuring Andrews & Dunham today, I thought maybe it was time for yet another debut for me. Because their Caravan is the third of the smokies that Auggy shared with me. I can’t actually remember what anybody has said about this one, which makes it a brand new experience for me. I’m expecting something Russian Caravan-ish.

Lovely smoky smell, but there is also a very sweet note here. Like syrup-y sweet. And something vaguely spicy.

As for the taste, OMG!

Oh! Em! Gee! o.O

So smoky! So sweet! SO GOOD!

It’s primarily sweet, as if it had sugar in it, and then the smoke is just rounding it off and preventing it from being too sweet. This is like SO seriously good. I’m all…

Excuse me, Steepsterites. I can’t finish this post. This tea and me, we would like to spend some time alone…

Thank you Auggy!!! (Again)

ETA: If I give it a double-lenght steep, I can get two good steeps out of these leaves. A bit thinner the second time around, but definitely still very nice. Little bit of cane sugar added to enhance the sweetness.

I do seem to have contracted a case of the mini-burps which is quite annoying, but hopefully not tea related…

I’m seriously in love with smoky teas. No, correction: I’m seriously in lust with them. It’s a physical craving. None of this emotional, touchy feely crap. We’re talking pure, visceral enjoyment. That being said, yeah, I’m looking forward to trying this tea.

The leaf smells awesome. Sweet and smoky – a bit like a sweet barbecue sauce. (That’s a good thing, in case you were wondering). So hello lapsang souchong! Once I’ve poured it into my cup, it smells a bit earthy, like a good Yunnan. I have no idea if there is Yunnan in here, but I do get something that smells like it. There’s also something that smells a lot like Jackee Muntz, so some Keemun.

The taste is much less smoky than the smell… there’s got to be some Yunnan in here. Because that’s the main taste. A nice, smooth, clean, earthy black tea. That’s not to say it isn’t smoky. It is, but the smoke doesn’t overpower (for me). Then there is a little chaser of high, sweet smoky (I’m going to say this is the lapsang souchong) and a darker sweet but still smoky taste (which reminds me of the Jackee I just had so I’m again going with Keemun) sort of wraps around the whole tea taste.

This strikes me as very coffee-like. Not in taste so much as overall taste intensity. Very dark flavored. Sweet on the edges with an acidic smoothness (is there such a thing?) and richness to it. Not a chewy tea, but there is definitely some weight to it. The husband, on the other hand, is reminded of barbecue sauce (which I can totally see). He says that this is something he’d like on meat, but not in tea. Then he had me smell the pecan-smoke Liquid Smoke and while the Liquid Smoke is much smokier smelling, with the sweetness I can see a similarity even if the tea is lighter (not light, just lighter than the Liquid Smoke).

So yeah, I love this tea. It’s dark and broody and smoky and sweet and perfect for an overcast rainy day like today.

So I’m not feeling well today and stayed home to get some rest and sleep. My Tummys been queasy for the entire weekend so I haven’t even wanted much tea. However when my swap box with Terri showed up, I couldn’t resist!

My Internet isn’t working very well today BUT I needed to say that this is one hell of a beautiful smokey tea :)

http://instagram.com/p/YJQ-hRkyFb/

Doulton’s Shakespeare: a Tasting Note in 5 Acts
Act I scene 1

For when my outward action doth demonstrate
The native act and figure of my heart
In complement extern, ’tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at. I am not what I am.
Othello Act I, scene 1, 61-65

Today my Shakespeare prize that Doutlon created arrived to a standing ovation. I am rather overwhelmed by her generosity and will definitely “pay it forward” in the future as soon as I can put together something even half as lovely as what she did. There’s even a lovely handmade knitted tea cozy included – I’ll create a flickr account just so I can post a picture. It’s so perfect for my teapot Tim! There’s a beautiful block print card featuring a scene from Julius Caesar with a handwritten note. Thank you so much Doulton!

Now, to the toughest part: choosing the very first tea. After oohing, aahing, and squeeing over all the samples I knew the one that would persuade me. The one that I’d been avoiding because I knew my heart might break once this series was sold out. Caravan by A&D.

Throughout these “Shakespeare” tasting notes I’m hoping to label each tea either a comedy, tragedy, history, sonnet, or character. This one’s a character and one of my favorites: Iago. Here’s the persuasive bad boy whom I love to hate (and vice versa). I really didn’t think I’d find him so soon into this box if ever. This is different than any smoky tea that I’ve had so far. Most smoky teas remind me of campfires. This is not a campfire. This is the remains of a forest fire that happened at least a year ago. It’s rugged and masculine and it makes me jealous. I do not want to share this tea with anyone. There’s so little of it for such a short period of time and it brings out the irrational MINE feeling.

I think that I won’t fall into the same trap that Othello did. Or at least I hope that I won’t. I feel like I’ve finally made peace with all “limited edition” teas and am willing to have my heart broken when they’re gone. I shall openly wear my heart on my sleeve and be willing to have the jackdaws peck away. No ulterior motive. No jealousy. I just want wonderful tea while it lasts. TG

I just, this minute, ordered the 4oz re-issue. CAN HARDLY WAIT … and shipping to Canada is 9-11 DAYS.

I have so many tea samples to log that I feel overwhelmed and find myself just reaching for my favorites.

So, Caravan is one of my new “favorites”—I am its biggest fan.

Caravan goes perfect with pizza! :) All that smoky, woodsy goodness—it’s just sooo yummy, I can’t stand it!! And that hint of sweetness at the back of throat just seals the deal.

I love Caravan and will follow it to the ends of the earth! I just wish it were sold on its own.

The smell is VERY salty and smoky. Like campfire (or bacon). I allowed a few members of my family to take a smell, but non were very impressed (in fact, most were a little weirded out). I had to give up on my explanation that it’s meant to smell smokey because of how it’s made, and no it was NOT a Bacon Flavoured Tea (although I do plan on ordering that from 52 teas one day).

Once brewed, the smoky smell is lessoned, and slightly more tea-scented (slightly!). The colour is nice and dark, reddish.

TASTES smoky. A little too hot to tell, but the smoke does trail off into the aftertaste. It’s like drinking campfire. I think this is a Camping Tea. The sort of thing I would drink around the fire after a day of hiking, to replace hot chocolate. I thought this would be something that I would find too strong and would require milk with, but it’s not. I think milk would ruin the savoury flavour.

Continued: The second steep (6 minutes, no-longer-boiling water) was about as flavourful as the first. I’m sure I could have gotten one or two more steeps out of this, but I have to go to work, sadly.

It’s FINALLY happened…

I finally got to try this tea. I’m so happy right now I could pee…
ok…well, maybe not pee, but I’m pretty darned happy!!!!

Special thanks to Gretchen for this – got it in the mail today! YAY!

I have had BAD experiences with smoky teas and ok experiences with smoky teas. I can honestly say this is the BEST experience with a smoky tea – to date – for me!

Well done!
Great, great Cup!