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additional notes: Sipping this now and it seems Maya doesn’t have it anymore and the google search for the ingredients also can’t find it. OH NO. It’s really good. The coconut isn’t aging yet. Somehow it tastes like a coconut macaroon. Wish I had bought more at the time.

mmmm… of course I love this one.  Thanks so much, Kawaii433!  Other Steepsterers have not been wrong about this one!  I knew I loved buckwheat… it’s a fantastic flavor change from a usual nighttime tea. BUT THEN added with anything chocolate flavored!  That is amazing stuff.  The buckwheat itself is somehow a complex flavored thing — I swear each sip is different as it moves around my tastebuds.  And the chocolate just mixes perfectly with it.  However, I think it would be even better with cocoa shells than cocoa nibs.  I could always remedy that though, and add my own cocoa shells.
Steep #1 //  1 1/4 teaspoons for a full mug // 10 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 //   just boiled // many minute steep (10+?)

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – February 2023 Tea #8 – Your oldest oolong tea

No idea how old this oolong actually is (it was from the first generous person on Steepster to ever send me tea, as far as I can remember! Yikes! So this was a great prompt to finally finish this oolong) but I did enjoy it all these years!  I had it a few months ago and the flavor was still interesting, but finishing the leaves, they are a bit bland now.  NO FAULT of the tea however… I’m surprised it was fine a few months ago.
2023 sipdowns: 18

A rare Butiki sample from Michelle!  THANKS SO MUCH.  I don’t think I ever had the chance to try this one… would probably have appreciated it more now than then anyway.  I would have ruined it with my disastrous steeping parameters back then.  I was a little worried this is a ripe mixed with a raw puerh and what that might do with already shaky, temperamental sheng. But I shouldn’t have worried! The leaves are quite large and some of them twiggy, so I wasn’t really expecting a rich, dark puerh.  The first and second steeps taste like smoky BBQ spices.  There is a very clear, mineral quality that somehow also tastes like autumn leaves.  The brew color reminds me of autumn leaves as well. The third steep is very smooth.  A light, unique puerh.  I was expecting it to get bitter quickly because of that bit of sheng, but it really didn’t get to that point. Even that fourth steep wasn’t at all bitter, but lost some of the BBQ.  I really appreciate being able to try another Butiki tea well past Butiki’s time!  (Still sobbing over Butiki — there will never be another.)
Steep #1 // 1 1/3 teaspoons in a full mug // 26 minutes after boiling // 1 minute steep
Steep #2 // 20 minutes after boiling // 1 min
Steep #3 // 10 min after boiling // 1 min
Steep #4 //  2 min after boiling // 3-4 min

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – February 2023 Tea #7 –A flavored white tea

I will count this sipdown as “flavored” though I know this is probably the most authentically “flavored” tea there can be!  I will miss this gem I found in a teabox long ago.  There aren’t enough great flavored white teas.   Cinnamon, fruit, hint of cream.  So good.
2023 sipdowns: 17

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – February 2023 Tea #6 –National Pancake AND National Sticky Bun Day

I ALSO had to have a pancake tea today, to go with the cinnamon roll tea, especially as neither tea is a sipdown.  (Getting behind on those.)   There is A LOT of rooibos in my pouch.  Like a LOT.  But whatever else they threw in here makes for a tasty, unique cup of flavors.  I guess it’s pancake toppings rather than pancake flavor. 

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – February 2023 Tea #6 –National Pancake AND National Sticky Bun Day

So sad today, not eating actual pancakes or sticky buns today BUT DONUTS are an acceptable alternative.  I THINK this tea can work for sticky bun tea?  It’s a cinnamon roll tea.  It’s good.  I must have had my mind far away, as I started pouring the water in the infuser that WAS NOT in a mug.  But crisis averted, as the infuser was sitting in a dish with enough side height to it and stopped pouring just in time.  Yikes.  But I like this tea!  It’s still got some oomph to that cinnamon.  It’s probably one of my favorite cinnamon teas and I’d day it DOES taste like a cinnamon roll, even all these years later.

Another mango tea!  No one else has ever written a note for this one? I bought this a looonnngg time ago, never wrote a note.  It just falls into that “generic fruit” flavor for me rather than mango.  It would have been more acceptable if this was “Extreme Fruits” rather than proclaiming to be very mango.  I do enjoy that a few fruits are represented here: mango, pineapple, strawberry, orange and tangerine.  There is an earthy quality and then there is a very sweet quality that my mind wants to think is stevia, but it might just be the sugars on the fruit cubes.  I AM always looking for nice yerba mate blends, but this one is never fantastic to me.
Steep #1 // 1 1/2 teaspoons for a full mug // 21 minutes after boiling // 3 minute steep
Steep #2 //  15 minutes after boiling // 3 min

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – February 2023 Tea #5 – An afternoon tea

Quick cup, no resteeps — that says “afternoon tea” to me!  This is from my gifted set of ten teas.  I’m not sure if the water I used was too hot.  I figured Vahdam might have added turmeric to the matcha to disguise that the matcha isn’t great.  Really, I can’t even tell there is turmeric here other than a slightly yellowish color to the matcha.  Instead, it’s a marine vegetal matcha — neither great nor terrible.

From Dustin!   A while ago we were discussing possible similar teas to almond teas we loved in the past (Teavana – Almond Biscotti, Butiki, American Tea Room – Brioche, Simpson & Vail – Almond Sugar Cookie), so Dustin wanted to pass this one along. Thanks very much!  Just looking at the dry blend, I can tell it isn’t the same tea as the others mentioned.  The differences: the black tea leaf is HUGE (the black tea really looks more like a Big Red Robe oolong), there are more almonds, and really, the scent is definitely more of a ‘biscotti’ type than a sweet amaretto type that the other teas have.  The black tea is quite light brewed up.  But the second cup deepens in color.  The flavor is super almond!   It’s more like a toasty almond and this particular black base really melds well with that flavor.  The cold dregs of the mug the next morning tastes especially great.   This is a solid almond tea that is unique enough that I wouldn’t mind keeping it around when I’m craving almond!
Steep #1 // 1 1/4 teaspoons for a mug // 20 minutes after boiling // 2 minute steep
Steep #2 // 3 minutes after boiling // 4-5 min steep

Actually, checking their site, The Tea Smith has quite a few blends I loved that I thought were gone forever, and also you can purchase them by the ounce for fairly cheap!