Snow Day

This has the look and smell of a guilty pleasure tea. It had actual dark chocolate chunks in it. I know, I ate one. I knew I should’ve expected more on delivery given that it had a Ceylon for a base. This brewed up a light amber-to-brown with a tangy, tiramisu-like nose. The taste was creamy and floral on initial sip, somewhat spicy in the middle, and chocolate sort of rounded out the middle. Not sure where the hazelnut went, it probably contributed to the tang on the forefront. Lighter than most cocoa cups I’ve had, but still quite pleasurable – whatever the weather.

Full Review: http://www.teaviews.com/2011/02/01/review-friday-afternoon-teas-snow-day-blend-2/

This tea confused me. With its chocolate chunks, hazelnut and cinnamon, I was expecting a round, warm, spicy, mildly sweet dessert tea. And dry, it smelled as though that’s what it would be. Oddly, when I brewed it, it tasted like a fruit tea—chocolate with apples? I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Thinking I’d accidentally steeped the wrong sample and got a fruit tea instead, I looked through my stash and verified that this was the one labeled “Snow Day.” The ingredients looked right. So I took it to a friend, wondering if my palette was a little funny. Also a non-smoker, foodie and tea-drinker, he smelled it, tasted, and replied, “Apricot? But you don’t like fruit teas.”

No, I don’t generally care for fruit tea, and, for whatever reason, since this comes across as one, I didn’t care for it. I imagine it was a combination of the sugar in the chocolate and the hazelnut that made it seem that way. I like my hazelnut toastier, nuttier, and my chocolate darker or unsweetened. I also am discovering that I don’t care for candy in my tea (chocolate, caramel, peppermints). I prefer the impressions of sweetness left by cocao husks, peppermint leaves or vanilla, to which I can add my own sweetener should I so choose.

However, I would expect people who do like sweets, candies, fruit teas, etc, to enjoy this as it was balanced and interesting.

Oh wow, it’s a tea I don’t have to input to Steepster because I’m not the only one drinking it! Neat!

I liked this one, but not enough to want to buy it. It’s a cheerfully chocolate tea, strong in the nose, but when I drink it, the chocolate somehow got muddled in with everything else and I lost it somehow. This doesn’t make any sense at all, but it’s what my tastebuds did with it.

(Also, because it’s got real chocolate in it, it left a glaze of chocolate on the walls of my teapot and I had to wash it rather more thoroughly. Fair warning.)

Anyway. If a friend offered it to me, I would cheerfully drink it and be happy about it, but I don’t need to keep it in my cabinet.