Sugar Plum Fairy

I had topped this off roughly two weeks ago toward the end of the workday. Unfortunately, I hadn’t made many notes regarding my session, but was kind enough to leave myself with this: Bubble Tape bubble gum. 6.8/10.

Advent Day 18

Smells slightly medicinal, which thankfully doesn’t translate to the flavor. Kind of a generic fruity, candy, spiced flavor.

Simpson & Vail Advent Calendar: Day 18

Clooooves ahoy!

My partner tried this one blind and instantly detected apples and clove; he pegged it as a mulled apple cider-inspired tea. I can see that, although I get more of an apple juice vibe than a cider one.

I don’t really notice anything too plummy, though. It’s more generic fruit juice with a little hibiscus tang and a lotta clove. It’s OK but not really something I need to drink again!

(Re: the cloves, it probably doesn’t help that I’ve simultaneously got a simmer pot going on the stove, and it’s very clove-forward! I love cloves as a scent far more than cloves as a flavor.)

This is such a well thought out blend here. So many ingredients that seem like they make the blend extra special: Organic green rooibos, organic whole cloves, rosehips, hibiscus, sweet blackberry leaf, flavorings, vanilla beans, mallow blossoms and raspberry pieces. The mallow flowers on that green rooibos base just visually pop. Sadly, I wish I loved the flavor of the blend more than I love the effort behind it. Mainly, there is a flavor of blackberry leaves that is the most distinct, which I wish wasn’t here at all. The hibiscus and rosehips aren’t making an appearance at all, even while brewing two teaspoons, which is fine with me. I’m not sure which of these ingredients I can actually taste other than the blackberry leaves which is a shame. On the second steep, the brew color looked like the inside of a plum, which is a nice touch. It even had more of a hint of plum flavor, which was nice, but I’m not sure if that was the other fruity elements… The second steep seemed like a completely different tea from the first steep and I’m glad the blackberry leaves were less noticeable in the second cup. S&V has an excellent black tea blend with plum flavoring, so I’m surprised more (if any) of that plum flavor wasn’t used here.
Steep #1 // 2 teaspoons for a full mug// 15 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // just boiled // 4 minute steep

Advent Calendar 2024 – Day 18

Yay, a holiday tea!

This smells like a mulled cider sort of blend, but kind of tastes like nothing? It’s a little bit like bland clove water, maybe I should’ve used even less than 8 ounces of water ha ha. I don’t taste the hibiscus at all, and only a faint whisper of fruit. Mostly I feel like I’m tasting the green rooibos? I have a half-ounce bag of this from the subscription this month, so we’ll see how that goes ha ha.

So this is a review of the recipe on the S&V website to turn this tea into sugar cookies…hope you don’t mind.

After a few cups of this tea, I gave up on it and decided to make it into cookies. There’s a sugar cookie recipe on the S&V website, and it turned out pretty well! You steep the tea in melted butter, which is fun. The tea flavor was definitely more obvious in the raw dough, whereas there’s just a hint under the buttery flavor of the cookies. The clove is too strong in the tea, but it works in the cookies, and the plum is tasty in there too. The cookies were pretty addicting when they were nice and soft, but once they hardened up, they weren’t quite as good. I don’t really like sugar cookies, so this was a big test that went…okay? I definitely prefer the tea ice cream recipe that I make, and next time I think I’ll try making an unloved tea into cake. Or maybe snickerdoodles? I definitely recommend cooking with teas though. It’s fun and makes the kitchen smell great.