I had a sampler of this a while back and didn’t decide to reorder; should have trusted myself, but the folks on the AU Facebook are so friggin’ bonkers over this offering that I felt like I should give it another chance.
I initially brewed it up and felt like it was lacking, so I added some almond milk and maple to it. All I could taste was cloying sweetness that the tea didn’t support, so I dumped it and started over. Left it plain.
Sigh. It’s fine. It’s truly fine, it’s not repulsive. But oy VEY, I don’t get it. Yes, there are butterscotch notes; yes, it’s sweet; yes, there’s some lapsang doing it’s smoky thing. There’s a lot in the nose; a smattering of it translates to the taste. Bourbon? Eh. I tend to the nerd-side of whisk(e)y, so I’ma let that slide. The base is just. so. thin. There’s nothing there to push all these potentially big flavors into climax; they just sort of putter around in the fishbowl without any destination.
I love love love the artful descriptions AU pours out, and I love their big unique inspirational reaches, and I have loved a couple of their single-origin teas (I see from browsing Steepster that I missed a yellow that sounds gorrrrrgeous before I discovered them). But, eh… all the flavoring in the world can’t fix a meh base. Can we imagine for a minute what a good malty, strappy brown-bread black could do here? Or a barrel-aged pu-erh accent? A brandy oolong? Guhhh.
Here’s to trusting one’s self, Steepsterites… cheers.
Flavors: Butterscotch, Smoke, Sweet, Thin
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Creative words to describe your experience. I realized at some point I love teas with body and so very often flavored teas don’t have the hips to carry the weight of all that top-heavy aroma. Quality base teas make such a difference for me but I realize we all have different itches to scratch.
I feel the same way about where flavorings often sit vs. where the bases come up (or fail) to meet them. Hips is a good word.
And yes — I enjoyed reading through all the notes on it and seeing some torch-bearers who adore it. One of these days I’ll dive into the underworld of tea swaps and send it onward to a better home that can love it more <3
Creative words to describe your experience. I realized at some point I love teas with body and so very often flavored teas don’t have the hips to carry the weight of all that top-heavy aroma. Quality base teas make such a difference for me but I realize we all have different itches to scratch.
I feel the same way about where flavorings often sit vs. where the bases come up (or fail) to meet them. Hips is a good word.
And yes — I enjoyed reading through all the notes on it and seeing some torch-bearers who adore it. One of these days I’ll dive into the underworld of tea swaps and send it onward to a better home that can love it more <3