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Made this in my curve travel mug, which I am currently loving but will review later, because I don’t want the ‘honeymoon stage’ to colour my perception.

I’m sad that river tea went out of business so soon after starting up, as I really did enjoy many of their blends. This one in particular got rave reviews, and so I pretty much filled my steeping basket with the trail mix and let it steep endlessly. I’m drinking it a few hours later, and it’s really like people are describing: liquified banana bread. I suspect that waiting for two years to drink it has not been kind to this tea, but I know it could be a lot worse. It’s begging for a bit of milk though, but even just like this, you can taste a ton of banana followed by the way your mouth feels after you’ve eaten dates, without the actual taste of date if that makes sense. Maybe a honeyed sensation more than anything else. It’s lovely to sip on and it’s helping to warm me up in my frigid office. And tasting better as it cools!

Oh my god, what a morning. Last night, I thought I’d save myself all sorts of time by setting out today’s clothes in advance (remember how we were encouraged to do that as kids?). I even decided which teas I’d take to work and which I’d drink at home, and proudly went to bed.

Then this morning happened.

I woke up on time, and made this tea with breakfast. it was quite delicious, especially because I was worried it wouldn’t be as I was using a larger mug and had to adjust accordingly. So in 10 oz. of water, I used 2 tsp of leaf and a sizable pinch more, still a fairly generous puddle of cream, and 2 tsp of rock sugar because i find grapefruit to be very sharp otherwise. Brewed for four minutes, and it was a most excellent choice. Because of the combined sharpness of the grapefruit and the bergamot, it stands up to additions beautifully, and always manages to taste fresh and invigorating, which is exactly what you need on a Monday morning.

But then I started brewing my work tea, and stupidly started filling the travel mug with the lid still on it because I’m a tool (it was just the mesh lid, but still). Whatever, got over that and sorted it out. Then, I blasted around the house looking for my water bottle, which I was sure I’d brought home from work on Friday. But nope. Then the doorbell rings, and it’s my ride. Assure him I’ll be out in just a minute, abandon the water bottle, and harness up the dog and get on my shoes and coat. Decide I don’t have time to let him use the bathroom, and haul ass onto the bus. Sit down, and then realize I don’t have my cell phone. Feel like I now have sixteen disabilities instead of one. Send Mr. keychange back into the house to grab my phone, but he can’t find it so has to call it from the home phone and hunt it down. It was in the bathroom. He comes tearing outside, and off to work we go. Drop him off first, and then onto my work. Once i get here, I let myself and Arden (my guide dog) into the office, and then take him down the hall and outside a side door to relieve him, something I’ve done several times before. He goes to the bathroom like a boss, and then guided me back to the door beautifully. Only it’s locked. So we stand there stupefied for a while, and then walk around to another door, which is also locked. I’ve also only been here a short time, so I’m not familiar with like every door on campus, and the sound of the nearby highway also drowns everything out. So then we just stood there, and finally a wonderful human being walked by and we found another door together, but that was also locked. But then she sightedly saw people on the inside and waved at them to let us in, which they did.

So now I’m back in my office which is freezing, but man this morning was supposed to have gone so differently. hahaha! But this tea was an absolute winner.

Well, somehow I managed to piss off my stomach, which is unacceptable because we’re making Crockpot honey garlic meatballs for dinner and there is absolutely no way I’m letting my stupid ugly stomach prevent me from enjoying them. So I brewed up a large mug of this tea in the hopes it would calm my stomach down. And it actually did, I think. It tastes like straight-up peppermint leaves and hot water, and there’s not much else to report. I do wonder if I could bring this tea to the next level by adding in some milk and sugar because then it might taste like peppermint milk which actually sounds lovely. Something to consider when I’m not massively pissed off. I am going to craft my future orders so friggin carefully, and not, like, stupidly just buy everything under the sun. God i’m dumb sometimes. would anyone like a gigantic box of tea?

Ok, so I have made a colossal mistake which has resulted in my wasting a lot of money on bad tea, and I’m trying to get over it because whether I like/drink the tea or not, the money is spent. And I’m really not one for needlessly torturing myself. But I also give up five minutes before the miracle, so basically I suck. Anyway whatever.

I was on the phone with my bff this afternoon when she said she was blown away by this tea when she added brown sugar to it. Thinking I’d give it one last chance, I brewed it up as such and still felt like I was drinking tea through a really bad cold. I consequently dumped what was left of my 25 g sample into the garbage. ain’t nobody got time for this shit.

This was a giant cup of no this morning. Too sweet, too flat, and just not enough of whatever it is i was hoping to get. It’s so hard to describe why you don’t like something, because it wasn’t horrible; it just wasn’t that good. And like, do I waste a tasting note and your time by telling you: I just didn’t like this tea? I guess so, LOL.

I got this sample at the meet at Sil’s, and it came via the ever-lovely and extremely likeable indigobloom. Thank you, my dear!

I had enough for a large cup, and was pretty excited, as the scent of the dry leaf is unadulterated maple. After it’s brewed, in my case for three minutes, you can definitely still smell the maple, but also smell the oolong base underneath. No cheesecake, but that’s fine by me. Taste-wise, it’s exactly as the scent profile would suggest—a lot of maple and an oolong base, and I’m starting to realize that I don’t think I really like the maple-oolong combination. I also didn’t really manage to get into Stacey’s maple oolong, which was likewise sad because it also smelled divine. it’s honestly ok though, as I really really loved the lemon bar oolong, and am glad that I’m not lusting after everything uncontrollably, which I’m prone to do.

I had a great night tonight. Mr. Keychange and I spent the evening with a friend, and Mr. keychange got to play on her new piano and we drank wine and sang songs and talked for hours. I love nights like that. You all collectively realize that you should do things like this more often. Just reminds you that there’s so much more to life than the stuff that gets you down.

Goodnight, all of you!

I put together a sachet of this to take to work today, so that i could use my kettle and not make a mess with strainers and leaves and other tea-related debris. Anyway, I had it plain, and it was actually quite decent given that my expectations were fairly low. There isn’t anything complicated about this tea at all: it’s a lot of cinnamon with some apple lurking underneath, and it was comforting and warming on a day when my office felt as though it might as well be outside. I think I might leave the bag in for even longer next time, since I don’t think there’s much of a risk of over-steeping this one.

Ok, only an hour and twenty minutes to go until I go home. But who’s counting?

So the truth of the matter is that for some reason or other, my beloved grandma’s pumpkin pie (aka auntie’s pumpkin pie) is just not cutting it this year. I have a strong suspicion it’s a change in the tea base, but regardless, the pumpkin pie tea of my dreams is no longer available to me. And so the quest begins (continues?), and I picked up 25 g of this last night to experiment with. i also picked up:
-the new curve travel mug, which i have been lusting after so hard i can’t even explain the lengths i went to or you might think i was verging on criminal;
-A tin of silk dragon jasmine (the tins were buy two get one free, and my friend wanted two and I got the third);
-Two pumpkin chai chocolate bars (and two for the same friend so as to balance the tea tin expense);
- 25 g of spiced pumpkin;
- 25 g of spiced apple
And the free honey crisp apple candle that I no doubt qualified for with my magnanimous order. So yeah, I’m pretty happy at the moment. I’ll review the curve travel mug after I’ve had a chance to use it a few times. But so far, it might have led me to believe in god again haha.

Ok so I brewed this up this morning to have with breakfast. Mr. keychange and I make it a point to have breakfast together every Friday, and that makes me so happy. Anyway, I brewed this up for five minutes, added in some rock sugar and cream, and went about drinking it. Honestly, I keep wanting to love this tea as much as so many other people do, but it’s just, I don’t know, so lackluster. Muted pumpkin that’s not objectionable, but so, so not memorable. I could use way more in the way of spice, and I don’t know if I could taste the base at all. Maybe I’ll try it completely without additions at some point, but I don’t tend to like any of my black teas that way, so we’ll see. Anyway, I’m still going to try to coax magic out of these leaves, because otherwise what do i do?

And oh my sweet dear god it’s Friday. There needs to be a drug called “it’s Friday”. It would sell like hotcakes. Or whatever else sells fast. Ipads? I don’t know.

Yeah so I screwed this one up really badly this morning. I hate that about making tea, honestly. I love that you can tinker with the parameters, but that also leads to brewing disastrous cups of tea when you really never meant to. And “but at least you learned something” doesn’t work here, because now I only have enough left for one more cup. And anyway, I didn’t screw it up because i was being creative; I was just distracted and careless and put in too much sugar and it just sucked. Oh well, one cup’s worth left and then I think about putting a milk oolong into my cupboard at some point.

Happy it’s almost Friday!

Holy shit. Last night, i was craving this tea, but I have a no caffeine after 3:00 rule, so I thought I’d wait until this morning. And oh my god, it was perfect. 1.5 tsp of leaf, used a generous amount of cream, two tsp of sugar, and brewed for four minutes. And I was blown away by how well this tea took the cream in particular. Both the grapefruit and bergamot were prominent, and the cream just amplified the latte-like thickness and comfort, but the zing of the grapefruit was not muted which was mind-blowing. I really hope this tea keeps well. I’m still on the hunt for the best tins in which to store tea. My ideal would be a tin where you can’t smell the tea from the outside, no matter how hard you try.

I know you guys know what it’s like to brew a perfect cup of something. Doesn’t always happen, but when it does, boy do you know it.