A sample from Memily! This one made my kitchen smell so gorgeous last night. If I hadn’t known it was tea, I’d have thought someone was baking some kind of vanilla pastry. I gave 1 tsp of leaf 5 minutes in boiling water. The resulting liquor was a fairly dark red, so I think I may have overdone the brew time a little. I have enough left to rectify this next time, though.
The initial taste is fairly tart — I’m thinking hibiscus, but elderberry could also be a culprit. At first, it’s all I can taste, but then the vanilla pastry I could smell in my kitchen starts to come through. The vanilla is so, so natural — vanilla beans rather than essence. The pastry note is light, buttery and delicious. There’s something a little shortbready, too. If it wasn’t for the initial tartness, this would be an amazing dessert tea.
I think I’ll try a shorter brew time for my next cup, to try and combat some of the tartness and bring out a little more of the vanilla-pastry-shortbread that has the potential to be so, so delicious. Thanks to *Memily" for introducing me to T2 — of the teas I’ve tried so far, I’m pretty impressed!