Dessert by Deb

When I was writing all of the daily advent tasting notes there was this kind of mental adrenaline to it that kept me pushing through the exhaustion/fatigue of keeping up with it all and helped me remember all the details of the many, many teas I was drinking in that condensed time frame without confusing them…

However, come December 25th it was like this massive crash and my brain finally took the pause it so, so badly needed and just sort of shut off for a day. I drank several teas on the 25th but I don’t remember the details of most of them. Thankfully, I wrote notes for the bulk of them on the same day but for whatever reason I didn’t do that with this tea. So…

I remember liking it but feeling like it tasted nothing at all like the name. I’m going to absolutely need to retaste though to give anything more concrete than that in terms of flavour. Gotta build back up to more of a halfway point from the total brain/memory shut down versus operating on high capacity like I was.

Oof, not a fan of this one… I think it was from my October subscription box?

The ginger is the dominant flavor, which doesn’t make it very cookie-like. I do taste a little bit of the almond flavoring, but it doesn’t mesh well with the earthiness of the dried raw ginger. Not really getting cinnamon or vanilla.

It’s not for me. Into the rehoming box it goes!

Sipdown! (22 | 511)

So this is a tasty hojicha. The roast is light enough not to be overwhelming but deep enough to have some nice caramelized notes.

However, I don’t really get much apple at all. There is some sweetness, but I think that’s from the maple crystals. There’s a hint of apple, but I don’t think I would know it was there if I drank this blind. Also, why no spices for an apple turnover tea?

Anyway, it’s pleasant to drink but only because of the hojicha base. Not something I would reorder.

Drank this at the same time as Banana Gingerbread Waffles; cannot remember which was which, but I wasn’t a big fan of either. Will try again later.

Drank this at the same time as Almond Cinnamon Brioche, and honestly am not sure which was which. Clearly the unique ingredients weren’t the stars that they should have been; I also wasn’t a huge fan of either. I’ll give it another try later.

A very unique spicing combination here, although there was some familiarity to it – I can’t pinpoint what it’s reminding me of, though. Also drank it a few too many days ago to be able to describe it, but it’s a nice combination, a bit fruity, and not too heavily spiced. I look forward to future cups.

Another October 2021 sub box tea. I was excited for this one, and although I liked it, it didn’t quite meet my hopes. It was definitely strawberry, but I wish it was a little jammier; however, the “toast” note came through really well, presumably from the popped/roasted rice. It was also nice that it wasn’t overwhelming (it is a bit in some of the other blends using the same ingredient).

Tea from the October 2021 sub box (but I’m not sure if everyone got this tea?)

I ended up rather enjoying it – a really nicely spiced blend, dark chocolate/pumpkin spice. I don’t always like the cinnamon Deb uses but it seemed to work well here.

Despite being a black tea, I got strong vibes of the original 52teas Peach Chai white tea – just a similar peachy flavour and spicing (cardamom-heavy) – and with the base of this one being fairly nondescript, it didn’t impact the flavour much. End result is a nice, unique, light chai that tastes pretty good without additions. Enjoyed this one!

Nice chocolate orange flavour, but I find that I crave a richer, more flavourful base tea. Probably because I just want every chocolate orange tea to be Butiki’s Two Friends, on a delicious premium taiwanese assam base. Because of that, though, this isn’t quite satisfying for me. I might try it as a latte, where the flavour of the tea itself is less important.

I really, really wanted to like this one, but it seems that the bergamot Deb uses does not work for me. It tastes wrong, and I don’t know why, but I dislike it. I initially thought it was the lavender that was rubbing me the wrong way, but after multiple other lavender blends, some of which I have thoroughly enjoyed, it’s clear that it’s the bergamot. Does anyone else have this same issue? It tastes to me like a different flavouring that is sometimes used as perfume, which I thoroughly hate. (Sidenote, I believe this flavour is also present in DavidsTea’s Serenity Now, and is one of the reasons that I prefer that tea when it’s well-aged – but there are also many other flavours in there so it’s not dominant.)

I mean, I didn’t expect to like this… and I didn’t. I also mixed the gross eggnog in with it, which didn’t help. (Fwiw, PC’s plant-based eggnog is pretty bad; there’s a bitterness to it that’s not pleasant. They could have done better.)

I probably didn’t have a great sense of the tea because of the eggnog, so I’ll have to try it again straight, but I didn’t really pick up on anything except peppermint.

My first tea from this company thanks to the TTB! This tastes a little toasty from the hojicha, and other than that I taste a lot of mint. There’s not much chocolate. The toasty and mint flavors go okay together, but not super beautifully. I prefer other mint chocolate teas, though this has been fun.

Enjoyed this one on a recent evening; the toasty flavours are just so cozy and comforting. There’s not a lot of apple, but it’s a bit more than just plain hojicha.

Love love love the base of this tea – a very pleasant, roasty hojicha. The flavouring leaves a bit to be desired though – I heavily oversteeped the tea, and even then didn’t get much apple, but it was somewhat sweet (pleasantly so, and acceptable as it’s also not artificial). So I enjoyed it as a sweet hojicha, but not really apple turnover. Certainly will be happy to drink the rest though, because I loooove hojicha. :D

Another rooibos blend, so although the flavour sounds good, I expected not to like it. Unfortunately, my assumption was accurate. Not really a fan – the rooibos is not terrible but I just don’t find it pleasant, and although I got the “salted” aspect of this tea, I couldn’t really taste the toffee. Just not a blend that worked for me, although I’ll give it a whirl as a “latte” later to see if that helps.

Excited about this tea – it sounded like a great flavour combination! And I think it is, but I the flavour was much weaker than what I was hoping for. I’ll try steeping differently next time, possibly with more tea? I probably used about the recommended amount, though.

Flavour is just very lightly lemony/raisin on a moderate black base.

Sipdown 27

On a role with the sip downs at work over the last couple weeks. I really enjoy the balance of lavender and blueberry in this blend.

Bumping my rating up, as I love the balance of lavender and blueberry with just a bit of bakery sweetness. The combination really works, and this is a great interpretation.

The lavender and blueberry flavorings are both super intense. I really like the balance of the two. Interested to see how this would fair with a bit of milk.

I think I’m going to carefully remove some of the lavender buds in Deb’s blends, and put them into other teas – I wonder if this will help balance things out? I do like this one, but I think a bit less lavender would help the peach pop more.

It amazes me how much I’d actually forgotten about newborns and how much work it is just to feed them/make sure they sleep safely. It’s exhausting. Little one is currently fussing; hopefully “bedtime” isn’t a 4-hour ordeal like it was last night…

Anyhow, another tea I was pretty excited about. Love a well-done peach tea, which is actually somewhat rare? But like the blueberry one, I liked one of Deb’s previous peach teas, so I had high hopes.

Unlike Almond Lavender Biscotti, the lavender is not so strong here as to completely drown out the other flavours – I can definitely taste the peach, and I like it! I don’t know that I’m getting any pound cake vibes from the blend, and I wish the balance favoured the peach a bit more, but it’s a tasty blend. Probably don’t like it enough to pick up more (I would need more peach, and more cake, for that), but I think I’ll enjoy what I have.

Craving a lavender tea, found this one. Yes indeed, it is a lavender punch to the face, and I enjoyed it. I could faintly taste some almond, but really, this is mostly just lavender, and that was ok with me.