Cotton Candy

This morning’s cold brew. I actually don’t mind this one. It’s sweet but not uncontrollably so when prepared this way. Now that I think of it, this tastes like the candy shells of Smarties (the Canadian ones!).

This was the drink that turned my admiration for DAVIDsTEA into a neurotic obsession.

I had seen the carnival collection in store when purchasing a gift for a friend, and smelled the loose tea samples they had set out. I thought they smelled cloyingly sweet, and definitely were not for me! I don’t sweeten my tea at all, and at most I might enjoy some fruit flavours in an herbal infusion, but I really don’t have a big sweet tooth and candy-flavoured tea sounded like a nightmare. No thanks!

Fast forward about a month, and I had a little games night planned with a few friends. One of my best friends, a total tea junkie, brought a pitcher of cotton candy iced tea, so of course I tried some. It completely surprised me! It isn’t nearly as sweet as I had assumed it would be, and has very soft flavours of candy and tropical fruits. It was lightly sweet and very refreshing, and struck me as a lovely drink for summer barbecues and patio parties. It tastes like pastel pink, and I don’t know if that’s just association with the colour of cotton candy or if I’m developing synaesthesia as I age, but there you have it! Baby pink tea!

The next time I was by the shop, I popped in to find that their summer collection was all on sale, and the carnival collection boxes were on special if you bought three. Obviously, I bought three of them, and then was sold on the Frequent Steepers plan, and then started browsing the web specials, and now I have a growing collection of their teas and mugs, as well as that same pitcher that my friend brought over, as she has since moved out of the country and couldn’t manage to take it with her. This was the first falling rock in the avalanche.

I brewed up another pitcher of iced cotton candy recently, and have found it a delightful take-along in a tumbler for visits to the dog park.

I love this tea was just what I needed for a bit of sweetbess bed for bed.

Blah, blah, blah. I will always love DavidsTea, but I don’t know what it is lately with some of these teas being so sweet they upset my stomach. I was so excited for this tea, and to be fair, it really does taste very similar to cotton candy. Alas, as I said before, this tea was so sugary sweet it gave me a pretty bad stomach ache and made me extremely thirsty. Also, I accidentally left my filter and just a bit of tea in my cup overnight and when I got to work this morning the remaining tea and filter had turned into a very bright orange (it looked like orange soda), so that didn’t exactly sit right with me.

I was able to try this tea at my best friend’s place. The dry leaf smells just like cotton candy, however, the taste, to me, was quite off. What is hilarious about this is that my Dong Pian from Red Blossom Tea tastes so much like cotton candy and it is a completely straight oolong. That Dong Pian is just out of this world and unfortunately, I couldn’t help but compare this tea to that one. I am a sucker for cotton candy and anything cotton candy flavored. I believe that my hopes were too high. The rooibos really overpowers the artificial/natural cotton candy flavors that were added. And I believe that the brittle in the tea is making the brew incredibly sweet. The notes that I could detect were: pure red rooibos, sour candy, sugar, and faint cotton candy. However, to be honest, I think the clash of rooibos and sour candy threw me off so much that I was not able to detect much else. (I’m off my game!) Looking at the dry leaf and smelling the dry leaf was a very pleasant experience. And spending time with my best friend over a cup of tea is always fun. The time actually inspired me to do another tea related (Well, in this case, the only tea related objects in the gif are tea lights) animation for my Tumblr!

I got it as a sample from an online order. I steeped it and, well… Though the taste was OK, it was too sweet and only made me thirsty. Unfortunately, this one isn’t for me.

Honestly, I was a little disappointed with this tea. It smelt A-M-A-Z-I-N-G I even tried the sugary candy before steeping the rest of my tea and it was delicious (obviously it’s straight sugar!) but I found it very bland and not tasty at all. It tasted like someone put water in a cup with a TINY bit of sugar to sweeten the water. I am always very good with timing my teas – I always put the timer on on my oven to make sure it’s steeped for the appropriate time and it still was tasteless.

It was good in the store, and then it was ridiculously sweet and concentrated at home. And I only used one spoon of tea (not 2, like David’s recommends) with almost double the water. Not sure if I wasn’t paying attention in the store, but don’t buy this. Very glad I got this as a free bag and didn’t waste money on it.

This is odd. I love carnival/circus themes, so I had to try this, but as I have mentioned before, I am distrustful of tea with sprinkles and candy. I didn’t add any sugar, but this tea has a sweetness of it’s own. I don’t get much on the sip, a little tart on the sides of my tongue, but the back part of the sip starts to taste like cotton candy as does the aftertaste. Afterwards I get that dry mouth rooibos thing happening and then a little sour taste. Not a horrible drink, but not amazing either. Glad I got to try some!

I love this tea, and I love real cotton candy. I received this as an “we’re sorry” gift from the company because I had originally purchased Birthday Cake and the tin it was in rusted shut after just two weeks and it spilled all over the floor when I finally pried it open. I asked since they were the same price if they could ship me 4 oz of the CC instead of BC and lo and behold it arrived. I was squealing like a preschool girl.
The flavor is so light and sweet, I was so happy that it didn’t fast like they just dumped a box of sugar in with the tea leaves. I’m going to stock up on more before it’s out :)