Tiramisu

My first order with California Tea House. Opened up the bag and I thought I was in my favorite Italian restaurant having some Tiramasu. Brewed it up and it had a very nice flavor. Especially good after work.
I drink it with sugar and a touch of milk to make it a touch creamier.

The aroma alone is enough to give a person a cavity. I don’t have a sweet tooth, so I’m not partial to teas that are literally sweet instead of just giving an impression of decadence. This tea was sweet, very rich, very good. A touch of honey made it into the perfect dessert. Yet, since I don’t like sweets, I wouldn’t choose to drink this tea again. The smell of the dry tea was so good, though, I’d almost buy the tea so I could inhale it in lieu of eating dessert. I suspect tea drinkers with a sweet tooth would love this tea.

I wanted to try out my new teapot, and since its main purpose was to hold moar water, I made a big ol’ pot of tea tonight, double the size of what I typically have for my nightly pot o’ herbal, four cups instead of two. This sampler was 14g in size, so I just went all out and steeped up the whole sampler. I ordered this ages ago, in the fall of 2017, and never opened it, and was amazed how much aroma the leaf still held; it smelled boozy, with notes of maple, caramel, coffee bean, and fudge. I wonder how much of that will present itself in the actual tea?

After giving the pot a very generous steep time, the steeped tea is a bit more caramel in color than I would expect from a rooibos, which usually are very coppery red. The aroma is still very enticing; I’m still getting that somewhat boozy essense, with strong hints of cocoa and coffee and a bit of a caramel sweetness. And the flavor is… quite nice! This is an old tea, so I’m impressed it has held up so well! The other tiramisu teas I’ve tried have had a very strong apple presense in their base, but that is missing in this tea; it tastes like a chocolate liquor, and I get a strong fudgy taste toward the end of the sip. There are also notes of caramel, coffee, and roasted nuts. I’m not getting any of the typical flavors of rooibos from the base, other than perhaps it is adding to the caramel sweetness of the tea; it certainly isn’t presenting as woody, grassy, or medicinal in any way. It’s very smooth and a very solid dessert tea.

Am I regreting I used this all up in one shot now? Maybe a little… but at least this is going to be one really nice pot of tea.

Trying this again. It has a nice alcohol like scent full of tirimisu, but when I sip it ends up a little flat. There is a little sweetness to it and then it all goes away. Weird tingling at the back of my throat. Kind of sad.

Tea #19 from Considering a new TTB
Normally I don’t start the day off with something caffeine free, but this sounded too good to pass up. You can taste the rooibos in it, but the primary flavor is coffee, which was just what I wanted this morning since I missed my weekly coffee date for the third week in a row. It manages to be sweet and creamy and I bet the addition of milk would only make the flavor more realistic. I may have to consider picking some of this up in the future, I haven’t had a chance to order from California Tea House yet.

I love love love this tea! On it’s own it’s pretty good, but add a little raw sugar and some milk or cream and YUM. It’s such a great dessert tea! I also love the fact that it is caffeine free, which means I can enjoy it at night when I get those sweets cravings. No tea will ever replace cake 100% (in my opinion, anyway) but this fabulous tea is the next best thing!