The queen's tea

A quite yummy tropical fruit black rooibos tea blend. Well rounded and flavourful. Would be astounding cold, but I didn’t have it that way. I’d love more of this. Very pleased with it.

Thanks for this one The Last Dodo! This looks like an Earl Grey blend (the cornflowers must make it the “blue tea”?), but there is something tropical about it… The base pairs well with the flavors, but the flavor is not really for me. It seems almost like cherry cough syrup than anything else which is odd because there isn’t any cherry here. That’s too bad! I’ve sipped this once before without writing a tasting note and it seemed more unique and intriguing last time. Maybe I had better fruits in the teaspoon I parceled out last time. I think I saw a rosehip in this one.

Sipdown (123)!

Made in a timolino to finish it off, and at least I can say this is better hot than it is cold brewed, so that’s something. It was more vanilla than anything else. However this company is doing their vanilla flavouring definitely appeals to me though; if I did do more exploration of the company it’d be with their vanilla/cream blends for sure.

It also had a sort of toffee note to it. Not sure what contributed that flavour though; there’s not really toffee in the blend to begin with and I don’t think I’m meant to be tasting that note with this one. C’est la vie.

Today’s word of the day is adage. An adage is: a traditional saying expressing a common experience or observation : a proverb. I’ll certainly try to use this one at work today, but with hardly any voice at all hooray losing my voice… that may be difficult to do.

Thank you Marzipan for the tea! I drank this what seems like ages ago, but just now getting around to writing about it. It was buried pretty far down in my queue. Thankfully, I wrote a lot of jot notes down when I did drink it…

- Cold Brew
- Sadly I think I have evolved past added sprinkles and bits in my tea
- Which is honestly a little sad; it feels like I’m being a bit of a buzz kill
- Liquor is a slightly more red amber colour; from the sprinkles I think
- Taste wise there’s something about the black base that irritates me
- I wonder if this company uses the same base for all their black blends
- ‘Cause I liked Vanilla Black Magick but struggled with Pumpkin Chai
- Definitely registered the peppermint/vanilla
- The chocolate came through in a weird way; very artificial tasting
- Perhaps artificial flavour was more from the sprinkles though…
- Chocolate didn’t seamlessly blend with the other flavours either
- What does the popcorn contribute!?
- No but seriously, does the popcorn do anything other than look cute!?

But yeah; on the note of evolving past sprinkles in my tea, recently I shared with one of my supervisors how into tea I am and she suggested I try DT’s Birthday Cake blend. I had to really, really hold in the loud scoff I wanted to make because she’s my superior at work. And, when I was down in Regina my Mom said she was telling coworkers about how I’m “going through a huge tea phase” (the wording she used pisses me off; definitely not a ‘phase’ – but that’s not the point here). All her coworkers urged her to buy me DT’s Birthday Cake blend.

Part of me is frustrated that particular blend seems to be many people’s shining standard of “good tea” when it’s really not, but I’m also conflicted because it is, in fact, that particular blend that got me interested in tea in the first place. Just goes to show how far I’ve come as a tea drinker, I suppose.

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This is not a tea that’ll be memorable in the long run; and if I do remember it then it’s going to be for negative things. But having said that, to finish this one off I did a hot brew to contrast the absolutely awful cold brew I did and it was a bit better hot.

I still think there was zero fig flavour in the tea which is a major fail given the name of the blend, but at least it was drinkable. Still, mostly a very choppy tasting, low quality black base and nasty, nasty lavender. Wont be revisiting this tea – period.

Today’s word of the day: Infatuated. Infatuated means: “To be filled with a foolish or excessive love or admiration”. This is definitely a word that I was familiar with prior to seeing it on my calendar today, and it’s probably one of the easiest ones to use in conversation thus far.

WOW THIS ONE WASN’T GOOD.

I cold brewed most of my sample of this last week (I’m actually currently drinking the last of it hot but that review wont be posted today), and I think that was definitely a mistake. All I could taste was an abundance of crappy, sudsy lavender and chemical-y perfume and something that, God help me, tasted like broth!?

90% of this was dumped straight back into the sink; and it took me a whole week to work up the nerve to try this one again. Sorry Marzipan, I was hopefuly because I like fig but something is definitely wrong with this blend…

Sipdown (114)!

Timolino w. milk.

Wow, this came out so unbelievably weak; adding milk probably didn’t help much at all either. Emphasizing that, again, I taste zero pumpkin; but even worse than that all I can taste in this cup is a strong, lingering ginger flavour that’s ticking my tongue in an unpleasant way over a rather generic, milky black base.

I want to believe that with enough experimentation you’d be able to make this tea work, especially given I did taste some nicer/more interesting notes with my first cup (earth and soil) but as someone who doesn’t like Chai much to begin with I’m not willing to invest any more time into getting this blend to cooperate.

Anyway; goodnight Steepster!

Thank you Marzipan for the sample!

I’m typically not a Chai fan so I don’t often try/buy them or request them as samples but when someone sends me one I’ll certainly do my best to try it as openly and unprejudiced as possible, because I have found some surprisingly good ones.

This one I drank in my timolino; I found it to have a bit of a bitterness to it but also a bit of a “burnt” flavour, which is definitely different than bitter in my opinion. It was really clove/cardamom heavy in my opinion with lesser notes of ginger and maybe vanilla? Something a little softer/sweeter, anyway. I really didn’t taste any pumpkin which was disappointing. Too many “Pumpkin Spice” type teas put the emphasis on the spice. I think it should be the other way.

I also thought that the base had a roughness/rawness to it that wasn’t entirely unpleasant though; and reading Cameron B.’s tasting note on this one and seeing her describe this one as kind of earthy, I think that’s what I was experiencing too. Personally, this aspect was my favourite part of the blend though overall I wasn’t super impressed with this one.

I wont give it a numerical rating since, as I typically non-Chai fan I’m a fair bit biased but if I was going to, I think it’d be high 50s or low 60s.

Sipdown (112)!

Thank you Marzipan for the sample! Instead of cold brewed, I finished this one off hot in one of my timolinos. It made for a lovely, sweet treat to sip on during the bus ride home from work. The rich, custardy vanilla flavour really softens the maltier black base here. This time, I feel like I also picked up on a few floral tones as well.

Both times I had this one I was impressed with just how strong and defined the vanilla came across. One of my favourite vanilla black teas to date.

Thanks Marzipan for the sample, and introduction to another new to me company!

I admit that straight up black/vanilla teas typically fall short for me so I was definitely skeptical by going off dry smell alone this already seemed to have more of a vanilla flavour than most vanilla teas, so I was holding onto a little bit of hope.

For my first taste of this one I went with a cold brew; to my general surprise I actually very much enjoyed this blend. The vanilla was alarmingly strong, especially when you compare it to most straight up black/vanilla blends I’ve been exposed to. It had a lovely thickness of mouthfeel and a rich custard/tapioca pudding vibe to it.

The black base itself was pretty good too; rather brisk but rounded up by the vanilla. It’s funny, I just finished reading Cameron B.’s review on this one and it seems like the only thing we’re in agreement about is that there was a woodiness to this. She found the vanilla weak and the base mild – which is the opposite of what I found. Taste is so damn subjective it’s laughable sometimes.

This is another sample from Marzipan. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’m going to be a fan of this one. I can see the big chunks of dried ginger root in the tea, and ginger is the strongest scent as well. Since I’m not a fan of ginger, this probably won’t be for me, but I’m going to try it anyway! There are also some pale yellow flower petals mixed in, along with other various spices. Dry scent is strong ginger and clove.

Steeped tea also smells strongly of ginger and clove, and I don’t smell any pumpkin. Hm, yeah, not a fan of this one. I definitely don’t taste any pumpkin, and for some reason it tastes quite earthy to me. Other than that, the only spices I can taste are clove and ginger. Meh! Not for me. :P

This sample came from miss Marzipan. Speaking of Marzipan, she’s working on losing weight right now and it’s going well so far, so everyone congratulate her when you get a chance! This tea is made up of generic but unbroken black leaves, they’re very dark in color. I think this baggy has been hanging around with my sample of Pumpkin Chai too much, as the tea smells like spices that I know aren’t there. :P

Luckily, the steeped tea smells decidedly vanilla-y. It’s definite a dessert-ish custardy vanilla aroma. There’s not much vanilla flavor in the taste, unfortunately. It’s kind of there in spirit mostly. The base is so mellow that it doesn’t really taste like anything. The overall flavor is slightly woody with a touch of creaminess, and the two together do make me think of vanilla. This one’s just “meh” for me.

Another sample from miss Marzipan and her holiday package! Mm, another figgy tea. This should be interesting. For some reason, they felt the need to add lavender to this tea, which doesn’t make sense to me if it’s supposed to be figgy pudding. Am I missing something? Ah well, I’ll try it anyway because fig. There was one huge piece of dried fig in the sample, and I made sure to get it into my cup.

I can definitely smell the lavender in the steeped tea, but I can also smell some yummy and strong fig aroma. Oof, there’s definitely too much lavender in this one for me, and it’s overpowering the delicious figginess. I can taste the fig slightly in the background, and then it comes out a bit at the end, but otherwise it might as well be lavender black tea. :(

This sample is from Marzipan. She sent me a few teas by this company in her holiday package. This looks like it’s basically the same thing as David’s Santa’s Secret – black tea with peppermint, vanilla, and sprinkles. Although this version has some odd things in it… My sample has an unpopped popcorn kernel, which I can’t imagine serving a purpose, and some of those little silver dragee sprinkles. Dry scent is mildly minty and sweet.

Hm, this is just okay for me. The black tea base doesn’t have a lot of taste. The peppermint is nice and mild, which I appreciate. However, I think it could do with a touch more vanilla to balance the mint. It’s not bad, but not amazing either.

Merry Christmas! This was a tea that I got from my parents from a locally owned shop in my hometown of Salt Lake. This is one of my shameless guilty pleasure teas. It really does put me in the festive mood. I like how the vanilla and peppermint flavors don’t overpower each other. The black tea base isn’t big and robust, but is a main flavor here. The tiny silver chocolate balls in the tea melt and add silver sparkles in my cup :P
I noticed that this is not a unique blend exclusive to the Queen’s Tea alone. I noticed many other tea companies had something pretty much exactly like it on their websites as well. Good! This is the most festive tea I have had and I think others need to get in on this :)
Have a happy holidays everyone!