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I got this tea in the ‘best of 2016’ collection and decided to give it a try since I need to clear out some cupboard space. Sadly this doesn’t seem to be for sale anymore so I’m kind of hoping this isn’t super good? Though the dry leaf does smell quite nice! It’s very fruity and light, perfect for an iced tea it seems. I will also say that the tea has a lot of ‘wet’ chunks in it, interestingly enough.

The tea smells about the same steeped, and has a lovely golden color to it. The tea has sort of a generic fruity taste to it though? I’m not quite getting explicit melon vibes from though, but it’s delicious and light so to me it doesn’t really matter.

Overall, I think this makes an excellent iced tea and am pretty bummed that it’s gone. Hopefully there will be more melon-ish teas from David’s in the future.

So the winter collection for this year came out recently and because I have little to no self control I had to also buy a few things on sale at the David’s near me. This was included in the harvest collection and it sounded the most interesting to try since I like fruity flavours a lot. True to the name, the dry leaf predominantly smells like apple, with notes of pear and something a bit sour which might be the apple pomace.

Steeped, the tea has a colour nearly identical to apple juice which is kind of cute. I did find that steeping it with 1.25 tsp/cup for 3 minutes left it a little weak, so I might try for longer next time. The flavour itself is quite nice though, it has a very light and fresh apple flavour without much astringency from the green tea. The only gripe I have is that there’s a strange flavour that’s also coming in, I’m not sure how to describe it other than a bit… like a musty sour? Perhaps that flavour is meant to mimic the tartness of an apple, but I find it’s not really working out.

Overall, I do think that this is a pretty decent apple tea, but the odd taste in the background means that I probably won’t get this tea on its own. I’ll do some experimenting and see what happens.

Day 24 of the 2016 advent calendar! And really all years, considering. This tea is very much a sign of Christmas to me, being something I expect to have nowadays for the colder weather. The dry leaf has cute candy canes in it, and smells like a milky minty, if that makes sense. Almost like a cup of creamy mint hot chocolate, despite there being no chocolate in this. I will attribute that to the vanilla, I think.

The steeped tea brings out more of the malty black tea base, which is nice. The flavor to me, is very much a vanilla-mint kind of tea, and I think it works well with the black tea. I have actually added hot chocolate mix to the steeped tea before and it’s 11/10 in my opinion, so its always a treat getting more of this.

Overall, I can clearly see why David’s keeps this as a seasonal staple. It’s not too complicated and has a great flavor, plus it works well as a base for other sweet holiday drinks as well. I’ll be looking forward to getting more of this in a couple of months.

Day 23 of the 2016 advent calendar! I’ve actually always wanted to try this tea because the idea of a green chai is pretty interesting to me. (I never got to try this the day of, because I was at my parents’ on the holidays and did not bring this with me). The tea certainly has a lot in the sample, I don’t see much of the green tea base. The dry leaf notes that I pick up are mainly the cloves, cardamom, and ginger, which is a good sign for a chai.

Steeped, this tea meets all expectations for me. The green tea base is nice and smooth, and the flavor of the chai is well-balanced. Each sip is nicely wrapped up with a bit of ginger as well. The only downside to this tea is that I found it just a little weak for my liking, but I may attribute that to its age instead.

Overall, I am very pleased with this tea, and if I’m in a David’s soon I’ll be sure to pick up 50g at least, as a nice pick-me-up for the upcoming cold days.

Day 22 of the 2016 advent calendar! When this tea came out I REALLY wanted to try it but I was on a self-imposed tea ban so getting this in the calendar was a nice alternative. I can see just on inspection the lovely caramel bits, and the aroma is lovely and toffee-like too.

When steeped, the Pu’erh base starts to come through a lot more, making me a bit skeptical of trying this. The tea tastes better than my initial offputting by the Pu’erh, and it does well at being an ‘English toffee’ tea. I think that this tea would be perfect as a tea latte, and is decent with milk and sugar.

Overall, I am pleased with this tea, but there is that lingering note of Pu’erh in the background which does knock this tea down a peg or two for me. If I get this in a collection I’d be happy to drink it, but I might reach for other hot dessert teas before this one.

Day 21 of the 2016 advent calendar! I am a huge fan of apples with warm spices so I am very excited to try this tea. In my sampler I actually got a BIG piece of dried apple which is a nice bonus. As for the smell, it is very heavy on the spices as you might expect, with the dominant notes being cinnamon and clove. It’s very Christmas-y so that’s nice at least.

The steeped aroma is basically the same as the dry leaf, but a bit more mellow. The color itself looks like apple juice too funnily enough. The taste is a lot less spice-heavy than I was thinking it would be, in fact the flavor is almost underwhelming. To be honest the taste of the clove is… the highlight that I’m getting. I am disappointed that there isn’t much apple going on in this tea, but there are many alternatives so I’m not THAT disappointed.

Overall, this tea is… a miss for me. Despite having lots of apple in my sample it just got drowned out by spices rather than highlighted by them. I’ll just stick with some of David’s other and better apple teas I think.

Day 19 of the 2016 advent calendar! My boyfriend is a huge fan of this one but I never really drank it, probably because the smell was so strongly of artificial almond. I will say that it is a pretty tea to look at as well. After 9 months though, I have noticed that the smell of the almond has died down quite a bit (chances are it evaporated?). Sadly the tea smells a bit musty, but I’m going to brew it up anyways and see how it is.

Steeped, the tea is a nice light green tea color, and the aroma is much more almond-y than my sample of dry leaf which is a pleasant surprise. By itself, the tea isn’t really that sweet, but it does come off as a decent almond-y green tea. I did add a touch of sugar and it helped in my opinion, making this tea into a sweet and smooth treat.

Overall, I don’t know why this tea gets a bad rap. I thought the flavor was great and had no bitterness from the green tea base. I hope they bring it back this coming winter because I will buy more.

Day 18 of the 2016 advent calendar! And a holiday classic this one seems to be, despite me never explicitly buying this tea by itself. The tea is very much a “Forever Nuts” offshoot, in that it basically has that same apple crumble aroma to it but with an added bit of… holiday sourness? I’m not quite sure how to word it other than it has that holiday aroma which is a bit tart, although maybe that’s just the hibiscus(?) being stronger in this blend.

Just like Forever Nuts, this tea brews up a bright pink color, which is always fun. The first time I had this tea I added milk, and it curdled so, fair warning to anyone reading this! The smell is warm and inviting and is quite fitting for a holiday tea I think. The taste of the tea by itself is… unfortunately mediocre. The sourness tends to mask the other elements of the tea, and even adding sugar tends to highlight the fruitiness of the tea instead of the warm spices.

Overall, this tea is… odd. It’s almost like a fruity tea with spices in the background, which isn’t really what I want from this kind of tea. Even if it was meant to be that too, I don’t find the flavor particularly appealing either. I might experiment with it a bit more when it inevitably comes in holiday samplers, but I don’t really want to get more of this…

Day 17 of the 2016 advent calendar! One of the new teas from that season, and with a straightforward approach as compared to 2015’s holiday teas. The tea smells well, like chocolate and almonds. I don’t really have much else to comment on, so onto the steep!

Steeped, the tea almost looks like a coffee? I’ll attribute that to the chocolate pieces adding in more dark brown color to the black tea base. The smell of the tea is much less nutty than the dry leaf for some reason, and it mainly smells like a chocolate tea instead. Taste wise, the tea comes off as a black tea mainly, with some chocolate notes and a fairly small bit of nuttiness.

Overall, I’m not disappointed by this tea but it’s not entirely what I expected either. To me, it’s mostly a black tea with chocolate in the background. Not sure if I’d buy this again if it was re-released, since if I want a chocolate tea I might go for something with a bit more oomph to it.

Day 16 of the 2016 Advent Calendar! It’s been over 9 months, goodness! This is a tea I’ve actually had before in the 2015 Halloween collection, but I never reviewed it. As for smell, it is basically what’s on the tin. A strong smell of tart strawberry and a bit of… creaminess? It’s a bit hard to really pinpoint because the tartness is quite strong.

As for the steeping, it turned out a beautiful ruby red color and smells less sharp than the dry leaf. The flavor is almost like a strawberry candy, but more ‘real’ tasting, with an odd note in the background that I can’t quite put my finger on. On its own the flavor is a bit mild, but I found that adding sugar to it brought the whole tea together for me. I have had this iced before and I was not a fan of it, but I think that having it hot is pleasant enough.

Overall, I think its a decent tea, but I can’t picture myself going out of my way to stock up on it.