Foxfire Chai

Wow, Brenden went and upped his game. He said months ago that he switched the base tea to a higher grade lapsang. It adds longan fruit and stronger honey notes. It. Is. Amazing. I really didn’t think it was possible for me to like this tea more, but I do. Holy frickin’ yum!

The spice blend continues to impress me. It’s well balanced lending to the smoothness of the tea. The smoke flavor is strong but not harsh. In fact, it’s sweet and does a great job of blending with the spices. I keep coming back to the base tea – it’s so good! If this wasn’t already one of my favorite teas it would be now.

…and my daughter just came in and stole my cup. Time to go resteep. ;)

My last pot of tea from this sample. I am really enjoying it this rainy morning. It has this lovely, silky mouthfeel that I really like, and it isn’t over the top with the chai spices – it is balanced just right. I definitely want to reorder this in the future.

Mmmm, this is lovely. Smoky, spicy… reminds me of sitting around a campfire on a cool fall evening, after dark, with a cup of chai in my hands.

So tired this morning and really needing a kick in the pants or the face…possibly both. It’s my own fault I was up late. I probably shouldn’t have taken a long nap yesterday and then spent two hours drinking oolong when I woke up, but it was fun :-). I thought a good spicy chai might do the trick. I did not know that this was a spicy, smoky chai until I opened the pouch but I decided to go with it anyway. Sigh….smoky teas are just not for me. I pretty much only taste the smoke and this is anathema to my tea drinking enjoyment. This is not the fault of this tea. I’m sure it’s lovely if you like smoke in your tea, but I don’t. I pretty much only like smoke flavor in my gouda and my sausage. Thanks for this sample though, Miss B!

Super smoky chai. I had this a few weeks back when I was still fighting off the worst cold of my life, and even then I could taste every really clearly — which surprised me. I ran out of my free sample (thank you so much!) before I could get home again to grab some marshmallow leaf and add it, to see if this could be more of a s’more chai than just a smokey one.

The base tea for this blend has changed since I last had it! I ordered an ounce of the new one, and this is only my second cup. It certainly is different. The smokiness is more pronounced, melding perfectly with the peppery spices. It’s making the back of my throat and tongue tingle a little. It’s very woodsy! Makes me think of campfires. There’s also an earthy, grounding quality to it as well. While the old tea base tended towards caramel, marshmallow sweetness (at least for me), this tea base tends towards honey sweetness with an undercurrent of freshly cut wood. Honestly, I prefer the former in a black tea…but that’s not to say I don’t like this one too. Looking back at my other tasting note, I mentioned that there was bitterness in the other cup. There’s NO bitterness in this one. Going back to the spice blend for a second…I like it. It’s warming, like an afghan thrown across your lap as you stare lazily into a roaring fire. Yeah. It’s nice. The peppercorn seemed a little strong in the first cup. I think that’s what made my throat tingly. The base tea comes through much better in the second infusion: it’s smoother, less smokey, more wood and honey. Would I reorder this? Not sure. I think there are other chai blends I prefer, but this would be nice to have around in the winter months.