Tower of London

Backlogging
Sunday night, holiday Monday in sight, family, good friends, Fellowship of the Ring extended edition, and multple pots of Tower of London. If there is a more fitting tea with which to indulge in Tolkien, I do not know what it might be. I am open to suggestions though.
I love this tea, and only bring it out for special occasions.

AlphaKitty is one of my tea swap buddies from the steepster book club, & so Thank you, Alpha! I’ve had Tower of London one other time, & it is a sweet & juicy fruity treat with a nice black tea base! One of these days I’ll probably place an H & S order, & this one will be on it!

I’m making a 2nd cup & heading for the bubble bath!

Thank you Ashmanra for sending me a sample of this and two other Harney teas. The mail man delivered the goodies today and this had to be my first choice to sample.

The dried tea smells like sweet honeyed black tea and candied fruit. Maybe berries? Reminds me of candied fruits you find around at christmas time.

The taste is has a hint of bergamot, a great tea taste and hints of candied sweetened fruits as I sip. I can’t place any individiual fruit taste, but I really enjoy this tea. It reminds me of the likes of Dammann Freres and Mariage Freres teas. The tea tastes expensive…it is great tea with great flavoring added.

I’ll be heading to B and N to see if they have more of this tea, otherwise I will have to place another Harney soon! Thanks again Ashmanra.

Thanks Ashmanra for this sample tea!

My experience with Harney & Son’s Tea is almost ‘0’. I think the only one I’ve had is Paris and that’s it. (Maybe one other that was a teabag…can’t remember.)

When Ashmanra wanted to send me some tea in exchange for the Lapsang Souchong (and some other tea’s) I was sending her, I took advantage of the Harney’s in her cupboard. “Now’s my chance!”, I said to myself!

In the beginning (tea bible), I drank lots of flavored tea’s, mostly from Davids and a few other brands. That was so much fun even though I had to wait for the shipments to arrive from Canada.
Then, I looked at the top of the Tea list on Steepster and noticed several companies that were repeatedly mentioned for quality and began trying them out. Pretty soon, I had more unflavored tea than flavored. What a switch!

This morning, instead of a Black tea or Assam or Pu-erh to charge me for the day, I picked up a flavored tea (something I haven’t done for awhile).

I was kind of excited about trying Tower of London, which seemed like having dessert for breakfast!

I didn’t even taste the tea without sweetening it first. Bah! I know what I like!
My first taste was creamy smooth and a bit like an Earl Grey, somewhat reminiscent of Paris with a splash of vanilla. The flavor was like French Pastry and I liked it.
I carefully added some cream which gave the tea an even more intense pastry aire.

What a lovely way to begin the day with the end of Summer just ahead. We’ll soon be putting away our whites and pastels until next year.
I had my light, sweet dessert tea along with a baguette, butter and some berries in a bowl. All perfect for beginning my day with a smile!

I took this one to work yesterday. That was my mistake – I wasn’t thinking. I assumed this was a straight black blend, didn’t look it up, didn’t think about it. Made a cup at work yesterday morning, took the lid off the infuser and was hit in the face with bergamot. Hmmm this is a flavor blend, and it’s an earl grey esq flavor. I really appreciate the sample ifjuly but this doesn’t work for me. I don’t think I will ever like bergamot. :((

This is a lovely black with a melange of stone fruits that remind me of the orchards in the south island where I grew up. I’m getting apricots, nectarines, plum, maybe a touch of fresh dark cherries. The stone fruits come through more strongly in fragrance than taste. When it’s raining and dreary, like it is today, and I’m after something comforting, this is my go-to cup with milk. Sometimes with sugar, but not often.

Sipdown! 796. Sigh… it’s never-ending!

This is a touch strong tonight, probably because I forgot and didn’t brew it in an extra-large mug. Oops. It’s still pretty tasty though. Kind of a fruity EGC, although only just a bit of creaminess, which I assume is actually honey. This is certainly not a tea I’d turn down if offered; it’s a great example of a good flavoured black, especially for a bagged tea.

Thanks again for sharing this, whatshesaid :)

ETA: A bagged tea that lasts for 3 good infusions? Colour me impressed.

I’ve been so busy this week that I have about a dozen teas I have to log that I had absolutely no time for! This week was Toy Fair, and I also had a friend over from Oregon so I admit that I neglected Steepster for a while. So many tasting notes to catch up on!

My friend is a fellow tea addict who I am converting to loose-leaf, so we did a lot of tea shopping while he was here. Including going to my favorite physical tea store, Harney & Sons! I picked up a few things while I was there, and added in 2 ounces of this at the last minute because I’ve heard people say that it’s better than Paris. Better than one of my favorite blends, of course I had to try it out!

This does indeed remind me a lot of Paris. There’s a plum and berry taste, similar to the blackcurrant in Paris, along with a hint of bergamot and cream. But it’s not quite as all-around rich and deep as Paris—the flavor is more shallow, if that makes sense, though it’s still tasty. This is like a lighter version of Paris, better suited for the afternoon or morning since I generally think of Paris as a late-night indulgence.

I found a tagalong of this languishing in my tea cupboard so I brought it to work with the goal of drinking it. The last two times I have tried this tea I feel like I am getting a smell and taste of chocolate. On first whiff of the dry tea sachet I get unsweetened white chocolate. Then the smell and the taste of the brewed tea reminds me of dark chocolate, like 90% dark chocolate. I am not sure if it has been contaminated, it was in the tagalong tin, and I am not a chocolate person so there is not alot of that laying around my house. Anyway, I also taste the bergamot and am getting a lot of black current notes. It does remind me of black current preserves. I am not getting so much stone fruits this time around. Still enjoyable though!

I got some of this in my meet up/ swap with AlphaKitty yesterday! What a fun time!

This is a tea I’ve been wanting to try for a long time. It sounds so delicious! I can smell a hint of caramel. Toasty flavor. Lightly fruity. Very light. Hmm…not really tasting like honey and preserves. Whatever flavors there are, they are very subdued. In fact, I can barely taste it. I think Harney’s black tea blends may be formulated so that I can’t taste the flavors. I could never detect much in Florence either.

Soo…back to Marco Polo. My wallet weeps.