Pot O' Gold

Bleh, I so liked my sample of this from Amy oh but the package I got just isn’t as good. Plasticky flavouring. I’m trying to like it, but I’m finding it difficult. Might throw this onto the swap list as well…

I feel bad that the rest of the country is suffering from a heatwave and it’s still foggy and overcast here. The house we were staying at in the Oakland Hills was freezing! The downside of that is I feel tired all the time when the fog is around.

Anyway I am back at home with my massive tea collection and I really need something to perk me up before I go to the movies with a friend. I reached for this again because I was in the mood for something sweet and hoping the black tea will revive me! I liked this one, especially with a bit of soymilk and some sugar, it’s like a decadent dessert without all the calories.

I want to try Frank’s new black tea base soon, but I’m waiting for a flavor to come up that really appeals to me. Meanwhile, this is really tasty!

I forgot to log this sipdown last week…life has been crazy…hopefully things will start evening out soon, tho. This was a goodie, too!

I have been sipping this all day since it arrived in the mail. Its glorious. Butterscotch all the way – with a malty base tea. Excellent cooled, handles additives well.

Well AmazonV sent me this here tea to “rail against” (hey AmazonV,wink wink) and that’s what I’m gonna do. I just rolled my sleeves up so I can do some good ole’fashioned railing.

…OK she didn’t ACTUALLY direct me to rail against this tea, but rather, after reading my bio saw that I wasn’t prone to drinking flavored teas/blends and so offered me several of them for the opportunity to rail against IF I did in fact dislike one of the selections sent. I should add that I’m probably subconsciously working myself up to saying something less than positive about a tea, not to mention one gifted to me. That aside, on to railing…

Turns out I’m still not there. Though my expectations were not met, there’s still no harsh words to be exhibited for this tea. Lemme start by saying that upon opening the package I was met by a delightful smell…Cracker Jacksish; a mix of caramel,toffee, and molasses. there’s a whiff of something toasty, yet not peanuts or popcorn (I don’t believe anyway).

My mouth was watering during infusion and I was awaiting a strong malty black tea with a rich syrupy sweetness to offset it. I was dissappointed.
Instead, what I found was a faint malt flavor with just enough of the caramel sweetness to keep me from calling it weak. Concerned that I’ve done something wrong I resteeped it cutting the water in half, dropping the temp to just below boiling, and extending the time of infusion. This experiment left me with a gulpable tea that was sweet and had character, thou still didn’t blow me over. I must say,however, that it seems to take the changes well and gained no astringency whatsoever.

tunes-John Lee Hooker=Dark Room/Dimples/Think Twice Before You Go/House Rent Blues/Backstabbers/I’m Bad Like Jesse James.
Sidenote; I love the scene in The Blues Brothers where JLH performs Boom Boom Boom on the street and as it ends JLH mentions that he “wrote this song in the ’fifties”, to which a crowd member argues that he in fact wrote the song and the argument ensues. Good times.

Thanks to everyone who helped me clear out my cupboard yesterday! I was able to say “Adios!” to 10 teas! Woo hoo!

With mixed feelings Pot O’ Gold will be the 11th. I’m enjoying my final cup from this pouch and it’s very, very good. Maybe even better than the last time. I did throw in a couple large pieces of rock sugar, so it must have helped.

Really hoping to see this one reblended, maybe around Christmas or next St. Patty’s Day (hint, hint Frank!) ;)

SIPDOWN!

Thanks to kittenna for letting me try this one. Sadly this is pretty much a random black tea with some hint of something that might be flavouring but then almost might not be. I’m not sure if it’s suffering from age or what but it’s pretty meh. I don’t dislike drinking it, but it’s kinda like hey this isn’t a bad cup of slightly flavoured water.

In the continuing saga of my cupboard though…it’s all organized…everything IN my steepster cupboard is in fact IN my cupboard. Including teas that i won’t drink but may swap. I have a pile of 1-2 cup samples that i can burn through sooner rather than later as well. There are 25 teas not logged in my cupboard because they’re random teas from china that i can’t log and there are about 20 teas that i’m babysitting that won’t go in to my cupboard until i’m actively looking to swap things with people (all from David’s tea).

So the grand total as of this moment? 301 teas..including the 2 in transit via sharon, but not including the della terra and butiki order that i jointly placed with the girls here since i may not get those for a while yet.

I love life. It may be hard once in a while, but once in a while small details make me warm and fuzzy inside. This weekend I was made godmother to one of my friends kids. I am not much of a kid person, but I am thrilled to be Rafita’s godmother. He is a great kid. My boyfriend and I spent all day yesterday at the ceremony and lunch in his honor. I feel happy and light today. It is a warm fuzzy feeling that deserves to be celebrated by trying a new tea that I have been looking forward to for a while.

This tea I order along with my bluberry creamcheese danish tea. It sounded delicious. Butterscotch is super yummy. Butterscotch tea? Yes please!

The dry leaves have a bunch of yellow petals making the long dark leaves look like they are mixed in with little golden pieces (OK… you might need a tiny bit of imagination to get the golden effect going… :)). It smells sweet and rich. The butterscotch smells great!

Once steeped the butterscotch scent is less evident, but still smells delicious. Plain it tastes smooth and buttery. With a bit of sweetener the butterscotch pops up. There is a caramelly aftertaste with every sip. It is tasty and perfect to go with my happy mood. I drank two cups of it in a row. Each delicious.

Happy Sunday everyone! Only 5 days left until next weekend! :)

This will be my first cup of tea in almost a week! I had a virus and felt horrible for the past week, so I really didn’t drink tea, or much of anything for that matter. My mom kept urging me to drink some ginger tea for my stomach but with a fever I was so hot already that nothing sounded worse than a cup of hot tea (never had that happen before!) And I think I really just avoided tea because I didn’t want to ruin my love for it. You know when you’re sick and you have your favorite food, and then afterwards you don’t love it as much?! Yeah, I never want that to happen with tea.

But, today is my birthday and you can’t celebrate without tea, so I’m having a cup of this thanks to Mercuryhime! This blend caught my eye when it first came out, so I’m excited to try it. I’ve not really loved any butterscotch teas that I’ve tried lately, so I am hoping that this one is good. Anddddd . . . it actually is really good! I can clearly taste the butterscotch flavor, and it’s nice and creamy! No bitterness, but I did add milk and a little sweetener to the cup before tasting it. There is just a little maltiness, and a nice buttery-sweet flavor. I really loving this cup right now! I could probably drink liquid dirt, though, and be pretty happy at this point – I just needed tea! Oh, glorious tea, how I’ve missed you!

I’ve been watching the news, and my heart breaks over the Boston Marathon events. I know there are a lot of runners on Steepster, I hope that everyone and their families are ok. We had a lot of runners from our area at the race, but thankfully everyone is ok.

-Dry blend has large black tea leaves and twigs with large yellow petals.
-Dry leaves smell sugary sweet. Tea liquor aroma is of rich butterscotch with a hint of black tea.
-Tea liquor is a clear dark reddish brown color.
-Strong malty flavor with a sweet finish. Creamy butterscotch aftertaste.
-Best with milk and sweetener.
-Very good tea. Buttery sweet flavor with a hint of maltiness.

Oh WOW! This is SO YUMMY! As I mentioned yesterday, I had been sick for a while there, and my taste buds were slow to recover, but, I am REALLY GLAD that they’ve recovered so that I can enjoy this tea in all it’s splendor. It’s so yummy delicious good.

Deliciously creamy and smooth and sweet and I love this.