Who am I kidding….I was hooked on this tea just reading its description online. Chocolate. Yum. I am a self-professed chocolate addict, the darker the better; and delicately laced with any sort of fruit, nut and/or sea salt, even better.
So I headed to DT today and asked to smell this canister of lusciousness – a deep, wonderful, earthy aroma hit my senses, just as I had imagined it to be. Visually, I was excited to see healthy swirls of dark chocolate curls and bits of dried orange. I think my heart skipped a beat. It had me at chocolate.
I had the staff brew me a cup in my tumbler. The tea-barista asked if I wanted it straight or in a tea-bag – I chose tea-bag, despite the thought that those sumptuous chocolate bits dissolving into the hot brew would have been divine. I just didn’t want to deal with the bits of pur’eh and undissolved orange in my mouth.
I let this tea brew longer than usual before sipping, and left the tea bag in my tumbler as I always do. Since it had those wonderful chocolate bits in it, I swirled my tumbler every once in a while to allow the dissolved chocolate to escape from the bag and into the deep, swampy chocolate brew that had filled my tumbler.
This tea was far from disappointing. Dry or brewed, this pur’eh is very similar in scent – there is no deception here, what you smell is what you get. And what you smell is absolute enrapture – more so if you LOVE chocolate.
It smells distinctly (but not overpoweringly so) like Terry’s Orange Chocolate. You know, the chocolate that is shaped like an orange wrapped in foil and you whack on a table so it splits into perfect oranges “slices”. Yeah, that one. (I really need to stop comparing teas to sugary confections, lest I end up with a reputation akin to Mrs. Willy Wonka.)
As a green and white tea drinker, and relatively new to pur’eh teas, I have to say that I really do enjoy the warm, earthy texture of this tea type. And that warm, earthy texture comes through nicely in this tea concoction. It complements the dark chocolate and orange well. There isn’t a competition of flavours; everyone mingles quite nicely in the tumbler; you can almost hear the harps strumming.
I drank most of this straight, no agave. On its own, it is quite satisfying (that subtle taste of Terry’s Orange Chocolate). Once you add a dollop of agave (you really don’t need a lot due to the chocolate), it just heightens all those wonderful flavours and it’s as if you are in fact eating a slice of Terry’s Orange Chocolate.
As I sipped on this delectable tea, the thought crossed my mind that this would probably be a great tea as a latte. That is a big statement for me, since I don’t like my teas with milk at all; as a non-black tea drinker, that seems quite foreign to me.
This is a great dessert tea – in lieu of actual dessert, or as a complement to a light orange or fruit based dessert. Or just when you are looking for a little piece of heaven on earth.
I drink the Chocolate Orange as a latte and it’s divine, also, Terry’s Chocolate Orange is exactly what I think it smells like as well.
thanks @hayward68! I’ll have to try this in store as a latte then :o)