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Pass The Stash TTB
I love pistachio. so of course I had to try this. Nutty creamy and a little something unigue about it (probably from the Mulberry Leaf). The first half of the cup, while still hot, I kept sipping and going mmmm, and thinking how I was definitely going to keep this. But as I kept sipping and as it cooled, I started to reconsider. As it cools it loses some of the yummy nutty goodness, and its more of that unique flavor. I might or might not be keeping this. The first half was so good, but the second half was less so.

Tea & Chocolate TTB
Hmm this id s little spicy, a little bit orange, cream vanilla goodness. This is like a mellow chai, and I bet it would make a phenomenal chai latte, too bad I don’t have any milk. The rice is the blend makes me think of genmaicha, especially when unsweetened. But add a little sweetener and the roasty toasty goodness mellows out a bit and the spicy orange cream takes center stage. Both sweet and unsweet are super tasty.

I can see this pairing well with dark chocolate with orange, or even dark chocolate with chili.

Tea and Chocolate TTB

Backlog from last night.
This is a combination of green Rooibos, coconut pieces, and little red flower petal. It smells like coconut, like real coconut, it smells good. I’ve only had green Rooibos once or twice before, and now I’m trying to figure out why. It is so much more approachable and friendly than it’s red brother.

Steeped at boiling for 5 minutes. It tastes like I’m chewing on a coconut chip piece. Sweetening it tastes less raw, and more baked and creamy. And it lingers nice and long in the after taste. This is a really good last tea of the night to settle in and go to sleep with.

Tea and Chocolate TTB

I was really craving sweets this morning, and trying to be a good girl I decided to dig through the T&CTTB instead for something yummy. This smelled delicious so it won out. Too lazy to look up the parameters for this I just went with a typical 1tsp, boiling, 3 mins approach. Seems to work smashingly with this tea.

This is one of those teas that builds as you sip. First thing I noticed was the way this sort of coats your mouth. It felt almost like I was eating melting chocolate, the mouthfeel is so spot on. There’s a nice almost malty base and a hint of chocolate in the first sip. But each sip brings forth more sweet decadent chocolate and smooth buttery caramel. By the 3rd or 4th sip I was in heaven. The more I drank the faster it seemed to disappear.

This also held up well for a 5 minute resteep.

Tea and Chocolate TTB
Smells like very ripe bananas, and a touch of alcohol. There’s little chunks of fruit (banana and I think apples), red peppercorns, and some pieces bigger and smoother than the Rooibos that I think is cocoa shells.

Steeped at boiling for 5 minutes. I’m starting to think that might have been actual pieces of chocolate, not just cocoa shells because it’s a light brown milky color. Like a watered down hot cocoa. It smells like bananas and woodsy Rooibos. There’s some banana in the front of the sip, but the middle is mostly Rooibos.

Adding sweetener helps a lot. Now I can taste some sweet chocolate and some very ripe banana. It actually reminds me of mashed banana, about to be added to bread or pancake mix. There’s still some of the base tea there, but it’s much more mild. Overall not bad for a late night snack.

So when I made this last night, I didn’t see that it was one bag for 1 liter (explains why the bag was so large though). So I made it according to the instructions, but in 8 oz of water, oops.

While the aroma of the Buckwheat was that of peanut butter, the aroma of this smelled like slightly burnt popcorn. While interesting, I was slightly afraid it would taste like burnt popcorn, which is unpleasant. Thankfully, it didn’t taste burnt, but it did taste a bit like unsalted air popped popcorn. I added a touch of sweetener and it became sort of like kettle corn. You know, sort of sweet popcorn? Yum.

Another interesting tisane that I’m so happy I got a chance to try because I probably would have never noticed this!

The second the boiling water hit this, intense aromas of peanut butter wafted through the air. I literally exclaimed “oh yum!” out loud. I love peanut butter, but try to resist it because I could probably eat a whole jar, and that’s not good, haha. The aroma of the tisane once its been strained is less peanut butter-y but still roasty, toasty, nutty mouthwatering goodness. I tried it first unsweetened, and it tasted like delicious roasted peanuts. Then I thought that maybe sweetening it will make it more peanut butter like. Once I added some stevia and took a sip. Wow, there’s the peanut butter! I would believe you if you said that this was a peanut butter flavored genmaicha or something. This is so good. I can’t get over it. And surely drinking this is better than eating a jar (or two) of peanut butter right?

Oh, and it resteeps well! I’m on my 3rd steep with no loss of flavor. I’m so glad Yunomius sent this in my press samples, it something I never would have thought about trying myself, and yet now its something I can see myself drinking regularly.

I believe I got this sample from Jump62359.

This smells juicy and peachy and a bit floral. Steeped up is still juicy peach and floral aroma, but less intoxicating than the dry leaf. Holy flowerbomb! This is very floral, with enough fruity peachiness to keep it from getting lost in the wave of flowers rolling across your taste buds. The peach and the floral actually make a good pair, but it’s just too floral for me. I’m not much of a floral person, but if you are this is for you.

Editted to add, I guess I have tried this one before, seems like I had a much different experience last time. I mentioned the peach drowning out the jasmine. Total opposite experience this time, weird.

I need to eventually do a side by side taste test of this tea, and Bird Pick’s Yunnan Pu-erh. Its been 9 days since I drank the latter so it’s hard to compare by memory. The aroma of the dry leaf is more earthy, pond water-y. Theres also more dust in the bag, similar to how really tippy yunnans have gold dust in the bag.

The flavor is a bit more earthy than I recall the other pu-erh being. Theres also a bit of an almost cocoa note hinting at the edges. But aside from that, its very similar the other pu-erh. Smooth, not too heavy, not too intense, easy going pu-erh. I’ll need to do a side by side, but while I would like to have either in my cupboard for a nice daily pu-erh, I don’t feel the need to have both. And considering that this is 4x as expensive as the Yunnan Pu-erh, I’d have to say that it won’t be my choice.

Sorry I’ve been kind of mia lately. Last week I worked four 8.5 hour shifts in a row, and then on my “day off” I had to wake up, go to class, go home, study for a few hours, go back to campus and take an exam, go back home, study for a few more hours, go to campus again for another exam, go home, take a quiz, do an article and do a 200 question homework assignment. And then it was time to go to sleep so I can do another 4 days in a row of 8.5 hour shifts.

So today at work (day 2 of 4) I was nearing the end of my shift, and rushing to get my work done, and I guess I zoned out for a second, and managed to cut myself. Usually I would just bandaid up, and keep going. But there was a lot of blood, and I managed to cut through my nail bed as well.

So then begins the long fun process of filling out an accident report. And then, get this, I’m sent to a walk in clinic 20 minute from my job to get checked out, even though I work at a hospital.

And if you get injured on the job, you have to take a drug test. Well I guess I was severely dehydrated because it took 4 20z bottles of water, 3 attempts, and almost 2 hours for me to fill the little cup. I was frustrated almost to the point of tears. All just so I could get a tetanus shot and a paper stitch on my thumb.

The obviously after such an annoying day, I needed some liquid comfort. I reached into my pile of samples and pulled out this guy. And while he might not erase my stress, he helped make me a but more mellow.