I brought so many 52Teas blends to work today, I feel spoilt for choice at the moment! It was a hard decision, but I eventually settled on this one for my mid-afternoon cup. Out of the bag, it smells candy-like and fairly delicious, although not entirely natural. I’m really hoping for a good shortcake flavour with this one – if it has that, I’m sure it’ll pretty much be perfection in my book.
I used 1.5 tsp of leaf for my cup, and gave it 2.5 minutes in water cooled to around 175 degrees. To taste, it’s pretty good. The strawberry seems to settle down once brewed, and it’s not nearly as strong as you’d expect from the dry leaf alone. There’s also a really nice cake/biscuit element that’s light, airy, and deliciously buttery. I was so pleased that the shortcake element was accounted for!
The white tea base is a great choice here. It tastes just a touch dusty, perhaps, in the way that some white peony blends do. Nothing to really complain about, though. Mostly, it just allows the flavours to show to best advantage, and when it comes to flavoured tea that’s surely one of the major considerations.
The strawberry is natural tasting, although it’s not quite as strawberry-ish as I might have liked. That’s a minor issue, though, and one I’m more than willing to overlook purely because it’s just so damn tasty. There’s even a lingering aftertaste that really more scent than flavour – it’s just pure, unalloyed deliciousness that more than lives up to its name.
I’d like to try this one cold brewed in the summer, but I can’t see my sample bag lasting until then, so that likely won’t be happening!
