Noël à Venise

Advent 10.

It’s like sweet lemon-lime cream sandwiched between thin and crispy vanilla-toffee chunk cookies with traces of burnt sugar on crispy edges. I very much want to like this tea. It’s arguably awesome but I’m not a fan of strong lemon or lime and cream flavors mixed. The base black tea seems to play less of a role in overall flavor compared to the other Dammann Frères black teas I’ve had so far but overall, I’d say it provides a needed thickness to pull off flavors like this.

N is for…Noel a Venise

This came via Roswell Strange and I need to be honest because she loves it but I have had this multiple times and it always seemed to miss the mark for me. Until today…

Today I took a sip and I guess it was at the perfect temperature for this tea because it was a perfect cookie flavor with a lemon rose glaze. It was so sweet and decadent while still being light and just perfect. Think a cute little petit four. That’s what I got and then it cooled and that flavor dissipated a bit and now the base tea is peeking through and taking away from what this was.

Thank you Roswell Strange for sharing! It’s amazing how finicky some teas can be but at that perfect temperature, this is amazing!

Advent day 15! Toffee/caramel and lemon sounded very intriguing, so I was excited to try this one! Unfortunately, I found the caramel flavor to be a bit plasticy, which I didn’t care for. It was nice to see a change of pace from all of the straight citrus that seems to be in this advent.

Actually a little annoyed I like this and Noël à Vienne SO much, since it means I stand in fear of running out (for good reason, apparently, as I’ve managed to mostly plow my way through the original order of both), so I’ve had to re-up each of these on the back of my current “Hey, I’m just going to treat myself a little for Christmas; I’ll definitely definitely wait Several Months before ordering again” new DF order — but I find I can only order up to six 100g bags before my posting cost jumps up a level (and smaller quantities are not offered) … which means I can only try four new ones. What if I love two of the new ones as much? Then I’ll be ordering four Absolutely Must Replace! teas and only be able to try two new ones. etc. Until I have six AMR delicious teas, yet a relentless desire to try new ones. Now we see the violence inherent in the system.

One of my last samples from Cameron B! This one is definitely desserty. My uncultured tongue said chocolate, but maybe that’s because I was drinking it at the same time as a chocolate one. The black tea is nice, a tiny bit bitter. There are citrus notes. It tasted good, but I wouldn’t choose it over other similar teas.

Another new tea from the DF group order. This one is really good! It reminds me a lot of Della Terra’s lemon chiffon rooibos (one of the nicest rooibos blends I’ve had by far), but nicer because everything is better with a base of actual tea. Both the lemon and the toffee come through nicely. There’s a creamy meringue note in there as well. I’m not sure I can detect the papaya, or what it’s even meant to be doing here—maybe for sweetness? It is a decidedly sweet blend, rather than a tart one. This isn’t quite as unique or complex as some of the other DF blends, but the fact that they don’t overpromise to meld ten impossible flavors here means there’s none of the letdown you get with some of those crazy blends that can’t possibly live up to their descriptions either. I feel like the base is a little thin—I had the same complaint about Noël à Prague—but that’s my only real complaint. I would definitely be interested in acquiring more of this one at some point.

This one resulted in exactly what I was hoping, at least! Full of sweet creamy lemon flavor! Just like lemon meringue. All on a light black tea base. Both steeps the same deliciousness. The flowers are a nice touch. I’m not sure how the papaya influenced the flavor, but including them is unique anyway. I think it’s a Ceylon base again, but sometimes a great flavor will make the Ceylon disappear or at least tolerable. I would definitely buy this again when my 25grams is out. DF sometimes over promises what a tea will be like, but this one is spot on.
Steep #1 // 1 1/2 teaspoons for a full mug// 10 minutes after boiling // 3 minute steep
Steep #2 // just boiled // 4 minute steep

You know, there’s a legitimate reason as to why I haven’t written a tasting note on this yet. The first couple times I had it, it was slightly different so I thought I’d hold off, but here I am, what, ten months later without a tasting note because it’s still ever-so-slightly different every time I have it.

When I first got my glorious DF group order package, this one immediately stood out as I was going through and sniffing all the pouches. It is so creamy and lemony, truly like lemon meringue pie. I just knew I was going to love it, so silly me did the opposite and didn’t drink it for months, hoarding it. Classic Swedish Chef.

I recall the first couple times I had this, it was a little disappointing. The creaminess wasn’t quite there and it was more lemon sorbet or something. Tasty but not as lively and bubbly as the scent of the dry leaf.

Then the most amazing thing happened when I tried this again a couple weeks ago. I steeped it, took out the basket, then walked out of the room for a while. When I came back, I thought, huh, I smell something baked. Bready. Is someone baking something down the hall? I’m used to smelling interesting things coming from my neighbours in the apartment so I was so sure it was that. But wait, no? I also smell candied fruits so it kind of reminds me of a cake, maybe? Toasty cake? I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what it is, then I realized, I smell freaking Panettone. In the middle of February. We finished ours just after Christmas and I doubt people still have some now (although the Italian grocery store not too far still has some, I’ve noticed). I know you’ve figured this out already a long time ago where I’m going with this, but it ended up being this tea all along. What I find so fascinating about it is that this is Venice we’re talking about here, so colour me freakishly impressed.

By the way, that cup unfortunately didn’t taste like Panettone, but like creamy lemon.

Fast forward to yesterday, I almost wrote a note on this but didn’t. Yesterday’s cup caught my attention in a different way. Expecting to taste creamy lemon, I got caramel heavily competing with the lemon? Where did that come from? And yes, I just double checked the ingredients list now and see that there is supposed to be toffee in here. Totally forgot about that!

And now, today’s cup is back to creamy lemon with a more obvious meringue note. It’s lemon meringue pie without the crust. No caramel, but maybe it’ll come through more once this cools more even though. I steeped this about twenty minutes ago so we’ll see.

It’s a refreshing change from the other Noël teas, perhaps because a couple of them in the series share multiple notes in common with other DF teas, whereas this one stands on its own.

Citrus notes. Black tea not bitter and balanced well with the citrus. Flavouring tastes a tad dilute.

Thanks to MissB for sharing!

Work – 11:00 AM

This is my 1000th tasting note! (explosion of streamers)

Not that it really counts since I took such a long break.

Ah, Dammann Frères… Definitely one of my top three favorite companies for flavored teas. This tea is a bit older (almost two years – I just checked), and while the flavoring has definitely become more subtle, it’s still tasty enough. I think this may have been my favorite of their Christmas teas I tried – it’s a lemon meringue and toffee black tea. I’m not sure I get the toffee anymore really, but I do get soft, sweet, and creamy lemon on a nice biscuity sort of base. It’s a nice change for a Christmas tea – no spices or orange, and light as opposed to warming.

Speaking of Dammann Frères, they’ve just released their advent calendar for this year (which I always try to order). So I’m thinking I’ll be putting an order in soon. Their shipping to the US can be a bit high – around 15 EUR – so I may put up a post on the discussion boards to see if anyone else would like to join in for a group order. Just considering it… Feel free to chime in if you would be interested!

I’m leaving my previous rating for this tea, as the flavor has diminished somewhat.