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I have had this tea on my shelf for far too long. I’ve just been too lost in my black teas that I ended up forgetting that I had this in the first place. But here we are, trying it out at last!

I remember when I first got this tea, I read the description and it sounded like I’d really like it, so I went ahead and did what I normally never do: buy a large tin of it before getting a chance to try it. When I received the tea, I remember smelling it and being kind of thrown off my feet at first. That was NOT what I was expecting at all from a green tea.

But here we are, months later, and I’m taking another sniff of the leaves and I’m not sure why I was so thrown off when I first smelt it. Sure, it’s not exactly what I’d expect, but it isn’t a bad kind of smell. So I decided to pack this one into my traveler and head into work with it today.

First impressions: Yes, this is good. It’s definitely got that roasted texture to it. It’s dark for a green tea (though I have yet to have too much experience with greens) yet still quite light. I guess I should say that for a green tea, this is a very full bodied tea. Your taste buds get flooded with roasted, nutty, malty flavour that is hard to describe.

Personally, I get more of a greenish smell from this tea than I do in its taste.

Side-note: The leaves in their dry state are very brittle and quite long at times. I noticed immediately that once I poured hot water over them, most of them turned into smaller pieces of the leaves, as if the water snapped them like a twig before they went soft. Interesting…

I can definitely see myself coming back to this one this winter. The only question now is, why was I turning my back to this one for so long?

I had no idea what to expect from this tea because I’ve never actually tried pure Ceylon tea before. If my first impressions were to write this entry, I’d say my initial reaction when I took a smell of the leaves was “wow… that’s a smokey aroma, kind of like a lighter version of Lapsang Souchong”.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t really get the raspberry taste from this. It could have been for reasons similar to Ricky (other review) where I may have steeped this for too long, but I don’t think I went too overboard with it.

The actual taste I’m getting is an interesting hybrid of Samovar’s Breakfast Blend and Ancient Gold. And as Morgana pointed out, the leaves DO look really interesting.

I was a little disappointed with the re-steeping ability of this tea (I only got 2 good steeps out of it) but again, that might just mean I have to go easy on the initial steep next time.

I’ll have to try this one again some time.

Trying a sample sachet of this tea means I only have one shot (and a few infusions) for a taste test. Personally, I like Earl Grey but it’s not my favourite kind of tea since I’m more a fan of darker, less floral tasting teas. That said, trying Earl Lavender was an interesting experience for my taste buds.

You can tell that this mix was done very carefully as to not give one flavour too much power over the other. You can definitely taste the lavender, but it does not let you forget that the base is still earl grey. In terms of quality of tea, this is typical Samovar quality. The attention to detail that other tea shops consistently miss is there, and as such it makes drinking this tea an enjoyable experience even if it wouldn’t normally be in my list of favourites.

I have to say though, out of all the floral themed teas I have tried, this is probably the best one yet. As Samovar’s own description states, “The aftertaste is floral, full and lasting”. This cannot be understated.

So it’s been a long time since I’ve had a tasting note. Summer time proved to not be a very tea-friendly season for me since I’m not too huge on iced teas and drinking hot tea in 35+ degree weather just doesn’t go well. In any case, it’s getting cold again so here we go!

I had this tea in my collection for a while now, but somehow neglected to truly give it a try. Once I opened the container and smelt the leaves, I knew right away that I’d have no issue with this tea. Sure enough, after steeping a cup for myself I was impressed by the simple, yet satisfying taste.

I have no previous experience with Darjeeling tea, so I have nothing to compare it to as a reference. However, I can say that the taste is similar in qualities to that of a breakfast blend tea, making this a particularly good tea for the morning… at least for me.

Overall, I’m glad I finally found a tea from Tealish that I like. I’ve had bad luck with my taste buds and their selection thus far, but hopefully that changes with time.

I’m surprised no one else has posted a tasting note for this one yet. I was looking around for something new to try from the yet-to-disappoint Samovar and I ran into this one. I’ve already tried Blood Orange pu-erh so I decided to give it a try.

The first thing I notice is that it is fairly similar in its qualities to Blood Orange pu-erh. The main difference here being that instead of the scent and flavour of blood orange, it’s ginger. I suppose this makes far more sense than it should. I’m still not certain which one I prefer more… I suspect I’ll have to continue trying this one out. Unfortunately I only ordered a small can of it, and I think I made a mistake of ordering a larger can of the other “experiments”… More on that in the other tasting notes to come.

The good thing about these Samovar pu-erhs is that they can be re-steeped an almost unlimited amount of times. (Unlimited to me is around 5 times in one day, usually 3-4 times at work and one more at home). With pu-erhs from other places I find that after the 2nd or 3rd steep it’s lost its touch completely. Just something I thought I’d note.