Vanilla Citrus Spice

probably my last cup of tea for the day with travelling and such unless i get off the plane and MUST HAVE TEA…which is always a possibility. HOping i’ve got the right balance of tea that i’m bringing to be able to get through most of it before we come home. heh esp since i know i’ll be buying tea while there. I actually have one more cup of this that i’m bringing with me for a rainy day when i need some comfort.

Final Count: 140 (1 swap and a few purchases incoming – 10 to go…)

This was my final tea of the day, so comforting to my throbbing brain. Honestly, it didn’t help at all, but it was a cup of solace. I like this best steeped 5 minutes, with a resteep of 7.
I know that might seem barbaric, but it’s also delicious.

A sipdown from this afternoon! I tried Sil’s steeping parameters of 6 minutes with a bit more tea, and it turned out quite good! I still don’t think I found the full potential of this tea, but it was dark and creamy vanilla spice today at least! I did get pretty caffeinated from it though, which was a bit bad haha, so I’ve been drinking herbals to calm down haha. See previous notes!

Sipdown. My last pot of this was so rich, like buttered spice cake, that I may have to pick up more asap.

From the very first inhalation of the dryleaf this tea enchanted me. If fairies wanted to capture me and whisk me away they would brew up this tea, I would taste it, and they could capture me without fuss. It’s that magical!

It starts out with the taste of warm, fresh vanilla cake straight out of the oven, but with notes of something richer and more wild than white flour- This cake captures the souls of wild dandelions and tea and and fuses them with vanilla- The kind of creamy vanilla that a person can only dream about. The kind of vanilla that so soft that it can only be infused with milky moonlight.

After this I taste the spices that could only taste the way they do if they were combined with fairy dust. Cinnamon, ginger, and citrus and dance their way across my tongue, weaving spells that work to warm and sweeten.

And the spell lingers…

It’s been over a half hour since I finished my cup and the scent haunts me like a melody calling me from fairyland. I still feel it’s warmth on my like it breathed all its warmness and delight into me.

This smells like the best kind of orange creamsicle you can imagine. Fresh oranges, organic cream from grass fed cows, honey to sweeten, bourbon extracted vanilla. Mmm… (Wait. I have a Zoku, I could make these!)

I’m sitting here sniffing my tea, almost scared to taste it because there’s no way it could live up to what it promises.

Ohhhh, this is… really nice. I think I’ll steep it 3 minutes next time. I used 1.5 tsp leaf in an 8-10oz mug. The tea flavour in the background is so lovely. The orange and vanilla blend so well together (mmm, cakes and ice cream), and the other spices are present but don’t detract from the tea that underlies it all.

It’s been my experience that Verdant does amazing blends, but I do not care for the plain teas at all. I’d like to try this one at some point, (Sil, are you paying attention? :) ) as this blend is really so, so good.

I can hardly wait to try it with more steeps, more leaf, and maybe even gaiwan style.

I don’t typically feel compelled to finish every tea I own in order to justify buying more; I seem to just justify buying more as a matter of course if I feel like it. Utterly irresponsible, I know, especially because I’m no rich lady.

Anyway, I thought I’d revisit this one this morning, because it had been a while. I brewed it up the same as last time, although I don’t really know what’s up with the two minutes the steeping instructions call for, because I don’t think I’d ever steeped a black for two minutes in my life, and didn’t this time, either. In the bag, this smells slightly candied, and definitely spicy. I can certainly detect the citrus notes when sniffing as well, which is always a plus.
After I let it steep for about five minutes, the candied scent had subsided some, although it was still present. I thought I could actually smell the cream I’d added, although I quickly realized that that may have also just been the tea smelling thick and creamy, which I love.
It tasted the way I remembered it: sort of like a spiced creamcicle with an undertone of vanilla. I will be delighted to finish up this package, perhaps with a bit less sugar next time (did I just say that?), and I may even reorder! it seems like the perfect cup of tea to snuggle up with while watching, like, scary crime or murder shows on TV.

Now back to reading and pretending I care about the subject matter.

My oh my, still yet to review. After that ever so slightly psychologically scarring experience with the pu-erh, I needed something to exterminate the smoked meat flavour from my mouth. Citrus should work. And spices. Vanilla Citrus Spice!

I just downed four cups. No lie. Well, two Nordic mugs.

The first was 2 tablespoons for six minutes. And then I added a lump of crystallized honey. Really smoothed out the spices since they were a little on the sharper side without any additives. I’m not really getting vanilla from there, and the citrus is gentle. Blends in so well with the spices.

The cinnamon especially stands out for me. And I’m so relieved that I don’t taste the coriander. That’s a close one.

Second steep got the same treatment, and yielded a super flavourful mug.

I’ll have to try cold brewing this sometime.

Before I start, I am just going to leave this here: http://imgur.com/gallery/isIwb. It got a chuckle from me. Have to love the magic of the internet.

Anyways, this tea came to me from Veronica. I would not have ever given this tea a second look, nor would I have bought it on my own. However, it gets a lot of love on steepster and that piqued my curiosity and luckily Veronica was generous enough to send me a sample.

Even smelling the tea, I was already preparing to write that it is not for me and offer up the other cup I have. I am happy to report that that is not the case. This cup has a little something for everyone – spice from the cinnamon, savory from the coriander, sweet from the vanilla, and tart from the citrus. Truly a well-rounded cup. Am I in love with it? No. Will I get more of this in the future? Probably not. But I am enjoying this cup and I won’t have any problems finishing up the rest of the sample. Thank you Veronica for the opportunity to satisfy my curiosity.