Lemon Cardamom Chun Mee

When Frank posted about this tea I was so excited, I think I might have been the first person to order it and it arrived today. wheee! This blend was pretty much made for me due to the fact that I LOVE lemon and cardamom and chun mee is pretty awesome too.

The dry leaf smells very aromatic in the bag. There’s lots of lemony citrus fragrance in here as well as a bit of sweetness.

I steeped this up via regular infuser mug method and I love it! It’s very citrusy and ever so slightly tart. You can see chunks of dried lemon peel and cardamom in the mix. The cardamom is subtle but it is definitely present. Chun mee was a good choice for this blend because I think a lighter tea would have been totally overpowered by the other ingredients. There is definitely a bit of palate cleansing astringency and it is strong and assertive. I’ve never been able to strongly pick out the plum flavor people describe in chun mee but I like the flavor of it. I know chun mee is supposed to be slightly sour.

I have found this to be so delightful and refreshing! But you would have to like lots of lemon because this blend is fairly strong in this regard. Frank, I loved this one and no I am not sharing with the rest of you. :-P

This is the tea with which I’ve spent most of my afternoon … infusing the same leaves, no less. I managed four flavorful infusions – well, as much flavor as my taste buds allowed me to experience, anyway! I could taste the tea, though, and the lemon and the cardamom. This tea was very good company to me.

Ugh! Cardamom- how I loathe thee!

I’m going to forgo rating today’s packet from the 12days of tea because my aversion to cardamom would make my rating unfairly lower than it should be. Besides, it says cardamom right in the name, so there’s no risk that I’d accidentally order this tea.

Despite my disdain for cardamom, I decided to still give this tea a try. I’m too curious to pass on any opportunity to try any of 52teas unique blends.

Considering how much I can taste the cardamom in this tea, I’m amazed at how I can drink it without making my bratty yuck face. It has that spicy warming feeling that I usually experience with ginger tea. I like this tea enough to say: if I had to choose a tea with cardamom to drink, this would be the one. But since I can’t see myself ever having to make that choice, I’ll pass on buying this one.

Sipdown! It can be a nippy little thing, can’t it? A lot of sour sweet lemon, a little bit of spicy sweet cardamon, and a grassy smooth base. I want to have access to a drink like this all the time. I feel that this would be a good late night summer tea.

Thank you LiberTEAS for this great sample!

This is my first tea from 52teas and I found it quite a treat! This is saying a lot, since I normally do not stray away from straight teas. I’m very pleased with my discoveries here, since this will open up more opportunities of experimentation and increase my tea options (as if I need more options or opportunities concerning my obsession of tea:)

The citrus fragrance is so powerful! You can smell it before you open the plastic sample baggie. I was prepared to embrace the full force of this pleasant smelling lemony Chun Mee, however the pour and cup was much more smoother than it’s fragrance indicated.

I found this tea to produce a very good cup even after multiple steeps (around 4 or 12 cups total) – think: liquid lemon creme cookie :) Also, it provides an excellent palate cleanser if you are having several different teas throughout the day.

After the first 4/5 cups of this hot, I decided to try it chilled as an mid afternoon drink for the family. It was a HUGE hit with the kiddos. I love it when it continues to be a family affair!

Cardamom and lemon is one of my favourite combinations to put in pancakes. A teaspoon of cardamom and a squeeze of lemon juice. Last time I actually had real lemons, so I used the zest and juice of half a lemon. It was gooooood.

So therefore, I have fairly high expectations of this blend. I’m not certain about the green base but on the other hand, I’m always sceptical of anything that isn’t on a black base really. And I also don’t really think that this would work out very well on a black base, if I’m honest. So I’m going to trust that Frank knows what he’s doing here.

I must admit that as usual I forgot to smell the dry leaves. I might as well stop saying it as it should be fairly obvious that I’m having a rather hard time making a habit of doing this first. After steeping, however, the tea seems to be primarily lemon-y with something spicy underneath somewhere. This feels like a good balance to me, having the lemon out in front. Husband sometimes cooks with cardamom pods which are great in the dish where he uses them, but like pepper corns rather strong if accidentally chewed. I can’t immediately pick up anything of the base, but even so I feel a lot more confident about the choice of type. This definitely wouldn’t have worked as well on a black base.

So the aroma being spot on, how about the flavour? Here I’m getting a load of cardamom with the lemon a little more to the background. It’s still a good balance, though. It doesn’t seem too strong and spicy at all and it rather reminds me of pancakes. That pancake black blend that 52teas does; I tried that from the Christmas box last year and wasn’t impressed. THIS one, this is a pancake tea for me, because see first paragraph.

Once it starts cooling and developing a bit, the lemon comes out in spades and it takes on the same characteristics as was found in the aroma. Good. While both the aroma and the inital sip felt very well balanced to me, I do prefer this lemon first one.

Finally something out of the Christmas box that really struck my Happy Button.

12 Days of Tea #9! And the third tea that I haven’t previously tried! This box is definitely working out better than I thought.

To be honest, I barely drank any of this. My cold is definitely impairing my tasting ability, but I drank a sip and it really tasted mostly like Sun & Cloud Mist. My mom was curious and had a sip as well, and ended up enjoying it enough to finish the whole mug, plus a re-infusion (which she mentioned was a little astringent). My bad on that one. I couldn’t taste the cardamom at all here, and neither could she. I’ll have to try a second cup of it when I’m feeling better. In the meantime, I need to introduce my mom to Sun & Cloud Mist!

I’ve had this a few times in my travel mug but I don’t think I’ve ever done a note for it. The smell is very lemony. It’s very natural lemony smelling though. Tart and sour. The flavor is nice. Natural lemon with a bit of sweetness. I like it. It’s soothing and would make a really nice iced tea.
I always forget about my teas from 52 teas. I push them to the back so I won’t drink them as fast. I’m starting to build up quite the collection.

I’ve been having an evening of baking…I wanted to enjoy this and then I ended up getting started on my mint cheesecake/brownie pie for Christmas. I still got to drink it although I just wasn’t paying too much attention to it.

When I opened the bag, my guess was lemonade. I hadn’t tried this one before so that was exciting, I hadn’t thought much of it when it first came out.

It was really good, very lemony, with just a hint of sweet spice. Still very much like lemonade but with a twist.

I may have it again tomorrow and then decide if I want a pouch, I enjoyed it a lot.

I love this. If you like cardamom and lemon (not lemon juice but a true lemon essence that you get from lemon myrtle); if you haven’t tried them together yet, you will be blown away how beautifully these flavours blend. Even if dessert flavours aren’t your cup of tea, beg, borrow or.. well not that bit – try to get a sample of this. If we are lucky, this will be reblended. For me, it’s up there with Sun and Cloud Mist. I have tried hard to dupe my blend of lemon myrtle, lemon verbena and lemon balm but it’s not easy to not have overpowering menthol flavours. Plus lemon myrtle is expensive. Get it all with this blend. Works for me.