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Nothing new to say, just this is the 8th sipdown from the Fortnum Advent! This was one of my favorites, the black tea being not overly robust and needing milk and sugar and the lemon more lemon candy. The lemon was not strong or puckery at all.

I don’t need to hunt down a tin to keep on shelf, but it was definitely a favorite and I would happily drink it again if offered.

Someone gave us some wonderful homemade lumpia so I made a sauce for it and a pot of homemade miso soup. That just cried out for green tea to me, and I really want to get some advent sipdowns underway. Elderflower would be way too floral for Ashman and he doesn’t like bergamot so no on the Earl Grey Green and the Christmas Green has too much going on and is too sweet for supper, so that really left only this one as a viable choice.

The jasmine is milder than I remembered, maybe because of what we are eating, but the green base is nice and the mild jasmine was not perfume-y. There seems to be a little buttery note to the base now, and the aftertaste is nicely sweet.

Although I have six empty tins from the advent now, this is not one of them….yet. But it is pleasant and will be easy enough to finish off.

The first sipdown of a tin from the Fortnum advent.

Very peachy and nice without milk or sugar but could take it well if you like those.

Had my Moderna booster yesterday afternoon. Arm is the most sore it has ever been with any shot ever. Headache and sore muscles means it is working, so yahoo!

I’m going to bed.

Today I imitated Bilbo Baggins and said, “Why not? Why shouldn’t I (drink) it?”

It is time to finish off the teas in the Fortnum Advent. The ones I loved will be finished off over the next week, I hope! I want to keep the tins stored with the advent box and I do not want it to linger half the summer (or more) with undrunk teas, so the faves will be hit hard this week and not so faves will be turned into iced tea.

My two favorite flavored teas, non-Earl type, were strawberry and lemon. Strawberry I will definitely only drink with Ashman because he loves strawberry teas best.

My favorite Earl Grey was the smoky, of course! I think the rest in order of rank were Classic Earl, Green Earl, Victoria Earl.

Favorite black tea blend – Queen Ann. I really wasn’t crazy about any other black tea or black tea blend in the set, but they were mostly okay.

I need to revisit Green with Elderflower. It is potently floral! I need to try it without food.

We finished one pack of Carol before Christmas, but I got two in my stocking! Ashman seems to enjoy strawberry teas more than any other flavored tea and I wanted to have Carol pretty close to having Fortnum Strawberry Black just to compare.

With Fortnum Strawberry, you sniff the tea and think, “Wow, strawberry!” There is no question about what you have and it is rather eye opening, invigorating. Carol is more, “Mmmmmm, berries and….what? Vanilla? Cream? Oh, and coconut. Just a little to make it creamy.” Perhaps a little more laid back and inviting you to sit back and relax.

So both strawberry but with very different vibes.

I spent most of the day outside alone, just trying to shed stress. It was 77F. I laid in the sun (the day after Christmas how weird is that) and listened to a sermon online, but the sun was in my eyes so I pulled an extra blanket over my eyes. I did not cover my mouth and chin. Or neck. So guess what.

Yes, the first sunburn of the year that usually occurs on one of our freak warm spells in January has come quite early, so I guess it is actually the last sunburn of 2021? Fortunately I was wearing a rather high-neck dress so it is just my chin and neck that are shiny. Doh!

Merry Christmas to all of the lovely people here on Steepster! You mean so much to me.

Ashman and I had a simple Christmas breakfast of toast and tea while sitting on the floor in front of the bow window watching the birds come to the birdbath. I wanted it to be special for him, so I chose his favorite tea from the F&M advent calendar as our Christmas morning tea. This one and the Lemon Flavored Black Tea were my favorites, probably tied pretty evenly.

It was a very nice morning tea, fresh and fruity and uplifting, we both enjoyed it.

FORTNUM & MASON ADVENT DAY 24

Ashman and I drank this last night. It steeps up a gorgeous Christmas red in the cup. Truly beautiful. Ashman does not like tart tea so I added sugar to his, but it was not enough. He drank one small cup and said no thanks to any more.

I decided it would be best to ice this and sweeten like any other sweet tea, and since it was so festive looking, I had it with lunch today. To my surprise, it was extremely familiar tasting as a sweet iced tea. Took me a sec but I realized it tasted almost exactly like jamaica, which should not be surprising at all. This is how I will use up the rest.

I would not purchase the refill for this next year unless they promise a different tea assortment. But the wooden box is gorgeous and it will be fun to decide what I will put in it next year!

Having read about the other advent calendar experiences, the only one I would consider purchasing is the one from 52 teas.

SONNENTOR ADVENT DAY 24

Thank you, Martin, for the adventure of having 24 new teas this month that are not available here! It has been great fun!

I love all the little reminiscences on the wrappers – someone did a great job of capturing the spirit of Christmas with just a few lines of writing each day. And the art work is pretty, too.

I switched it up and did Sonnentor this morning and will do Fortnum this evening. Both are herbal, but I am more likely to be sharing a whole pot this evening. Ashman woke up with a migraine but we threw everything we had at it and he feels much better, but we didn’t have breakfast together.

This is, like the others, a somewhat generic herbal tea but this time the licorice root is much more noticeable. I like licorice root so that is okay! Next I taste the Ceylon cinnamon.
The base is not too strong, a mix of mostly lemon balm and apple, with marigold, which I don’t really taste. Surprising, because marigold flowers have a pungent aroma and you would think it would be forceful in tea.

A good cuppa as I take a break from cooking!

Thank you, Martin!

SONNENTOR ADVENT DAY 23

Oooooh, this one is really lavender forward and I like lavender! This is a wonderful tea for relaxing on the eve of Christmas Eve.

Most of the Sonnentor herbals taste very similar, with just or two standing out because of some special ingredient. The lavender sets this one apart. Lemon balm is the first ingredient listed but lavender is the first aroma and taste I perceive. It doesn’t really last as the aftertaste, though. That resembles pretty much all the other herbal blends.

Hopefully the parsley and fennel will help with my overindulgence of warm cheese spread on crackers tonight.

This may be horrific but I wanted a matcha latte so badly today and asked Ashman if he would like one, too. He rarely says “no” when I offer food and drink. This is the only matcha I have right now so even though it is the extra thick grade when culinary grade will do, I used it.

Good golly, it was refreshing. I have some stainless steel cups. Made a paste of matcha and cold water in a matcha bowl. Put that in a cup with sugar and milk and used an Aerolatte to froth it. So dang delicious. Now I am out of matcha oh no I hope there is some in my stocking. (There will be. I ordered it myself. I mean, I was buying some for Superanna so how could I not? Heehee.)

Smooth, sweet, green, fresh, frothy. I think this is my favorite matcha, although D25 from Matcha Outlet is very good, too. The Harney grade just below this one is also great, and a good price for the quality.