New Tasting Notes

drank Lady Londonderry by Fairmont
15575 tasting notes

Of course, if you’re visiting Victoria the classic afternoon tea that everyone says you have to do is at the Fairmont Empress, so we obviously did that.

Honestly, it was nice but I’ll cut to the chase and say that of the three places we visited for tea in Victoria (and surrounding area) I thought it was the most disappointing overall for what was the highest price tag. Like, by a lot. Tea was good and food was fine, and the piano playing in the background did add to the ambience but the stricter dress code felt restrictive (and classist, a bit) and the service was almost uncomfortably professional. Plus, the seating was more cramped together with just less aesthetically pleasing surroundings. Not a bad time, but we for sure experienced better times.

This was the tea my mom picked for herself, but obviously I had a cup too. It was very, very similar to the one she’d had the day prior at Butchart Gardens – just lemon instead of bergamot. Basically swapping citruses. Still, nicely balanced and a kind of summery take on the more classic flavours offered on their tea menu. What can I say, my mom clearly has a ‘type’ when it comes to the teas she goes for. As we all do, I suppose.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

83

As I mentioned yesterday, we actually visited a couple different Murchie’s locations. I drank this tea, as a little mini pot of tea, at the Victoria flagship location – it was the last one we’d visited and at that point I’d purchased the blends I was most interested in, but I still wanted to experience the store so we got a drink for their parlor room before window shopping.

I am not normally a fan of decaf teas, black ones in particular. They kind of just taste flat and sad – like a tea that’s had not just the caffeine but also the life sucked out of it. However, I was curious about the black currant flavouring that Murchie’s uses and I thought what I assumed would be the more neutral/light tasting black tea base – as opposed to their caffeinated version – might actually better showcase the flavouring itself.

I actually enjoyed this a great deal. Thought a thinner body, the black currant was almost thick and jammy enough tasting to compensate. Really rich, and in your face without dipping too much into that more medicinal side of currant. Still a tinge of the good type of medicinal taste though. Not sure if that makes sense to anyone but me, but I do mean it as a compliment. I really find it a shame that black currant is, generally, so unpopular in North America when those deep, rich purple berry notes are spectacularly stand out. There’s actually a super interesting historical reason behind why it was a flavour so slow to be commercially adopted, if anyone cares to look it up. Basically restrictions on growing currants in the US for a very long time is the TLDR. So North America just wasn’t exposed to the taste for a long time.

The UK got it right when they created drinks like Ribena, IMO. This tea reminds me of Ribena, and it was just a nice time.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

This was the pot of tea that I ordered for myself during our afternoon tea service at Butchart. I was inspired by the large center section of the gardens dedicated solely to different types of roses. Though it wasn’t fully in bloom during our trip, it was just starting to bloom and seeing all the pops of colourful flowers among the bushes was lovely.

Plus, I’m a total sucker for a good rose black tea and Rose Congou are usually pretty predictably and consistently pleasant. One of the nice things about the blend, aside from the smooth florals that commanded the cup, was just how nicely it paired with pretty much our entire meal – the scones in particular, which had candied ginger and a really lovely fresh strawberry jam with marscapone clotted cream.

Of the three different tea houses we visited, I think Butchart was maayyybbbeee my overall favourite – not just for the tea but the food, service, and atmosphere as well. There’s one that gives it a run for its money though, but I’ll get to that in another tasting note.

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cs34k9mLqv3/ (…and also flower photos)

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8d2W1VUwvUE

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

One of the main things we did in Victoria we go to several tea houses. Three in total. The first we visited was within Butchart Gardens, which was just lovely to walk through even though several of the different areas weren’t fully in bloom yet. Very, very similar to Montreal’s Botanical Gardens but somewhat smaller. In particular I was enchanted by the Sunken Gardens, and this small area where you basically walked through the forest with these MASSIVE sequoia trees.

After a few hours touring the gardens we retreated to afternoon tea, which was also just beautiful. We were in this large glass walled sun room filled with plants and statues that overlooked more of the exterior gardens.

This was actually the tea my mom ordered for her high tea. She loves Earl Grey and also adding milk to her teas, so when she saw this was essentially a strawberry Earl Grey she got very excited. I did get to try a cup of her pot – as I said last night, we both sampled each other’s teas at pretty much all the spots we visited. It was very floral leaning, with a fresh strawberry note that was as strong as the bergamot. Very well balanced I thought. Quite “European” in blending style, but of course that makes all kinds of sense given that it was very typically British afternoon tea service.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

drank Matcha Latte by Unknown
15575 tasting notes

After Westholme we enjoyed spending the rest of our day driving around some of the areas outside of Victoria, including some forest bathing and stopping at one of the many wharfs in the area – not the infamous one actually in Victoria though – that was another day.

While at the wharf we stumbled upon a fantastic little pottery shop where I bought a yunomi cup, and we also grabbed lunch at the cafe in the area. I ordered a matcha latte with a shot of caramel syrup in it, and it was actually really fantastic. Just sweet enough with the golden caramel complimenting the more umami notes of the matcha and the creamy, frothy milk really well. Cannot for the life of me remember the name of the cafe though since it was just a little pit stop in the otherwise packed trip – not somewhere we had intentionally sought to visit.

Hopefully ashmanra won’t mind if I piggyback off this tea entry instead of creating a new one, even though this isn’t related to what she had originally written about.

ashmanra

I don’t mind at all, that old note of my will enjoy having a companion!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

This was the second tea we were served while at Westholme. Not one of the Canadian grown teas, but just one of straight teas they import from other places around the world. I thought that Victor brewed this one up quite intensely, and I actually loved how rich and tannic the infusion was with brisk and grizzly notes of malt, sweet potato and starch, leather, bitter baker’s chocolate, and plum skins.

However, I could see a few others in our tour group (including my mom) struggling with the astringency/bite of blend – especially comparatively to the white tea we had just drank. Thankfully, this tea was served with an assortment of pastries including a really delicious strawberry and apricot shortbread. The buttery pastry helped cup through some of those more intense notes, and I think it ended up making for a pleasant cup for all of us around.

Michelle

Grizzly, now I’m picturing tea with the bite like a bear!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

69
drank Peach Mango (Herbal) by Lipton
1104 tasting notes

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

Continuing with the last chunk of vacation tasting notes.

One of the first tea centered activities we did after leaving Vancouver and heading to Victoria was going to tour Westholme, which is Canada’s first tea farm producing Camellia Sinensis. It’s been around for over a decade now, and I’ve actually been fortunate enough to try some of their tea before as well. However, I wanted to touch the leaves – and touch the leaves I did!

The tour itself didn’t take too long as the farm is fairly small, however the space is beautiful and it was really interesting talking to Victor (the tea producer) and Margit (the in house ceramicist) and learning how the farm had come to be and some of the trials and tribulations that had to be overcome in order to get the bushes producing. Canada is, after all, not the typical climate that Camellia Sinensis grows in.

In addition to plucking some of my own leaves from the bushes and seeing the previous day’s harvest in the process of withering, we also got to taste teas in our own yunomi cups that we were gifted as part of the experience. Victor started with White Mist, which is their white tea they produce, brewed it a very large French press style pot/carafe for our tour group to share. It had been produced just a few days prior to our visit.

The leaves were somewhat crude looking, without the polish you’d expect typically. However, the tea itself was just lovely. I definitely found our first infusion to be less traditional in its tasting notes – very nutty and toasty with a prominent note of milk chocolate that is pretty unlike other white teas I’ve ever had. Underneath those more forefront flavours was a bit of the vegetal, crisp notes I’d more likely expect from a white tea. The second infusion was still plenty flavourful, though significantly less chocolate tasting with more of an overt snap pea flavour to balance out the toasty rice-like flavours.

I did buy some of this tea to take home – crudeness aside, it’s just really interesting as a white tea and I’m excited to get to play around with it a little more with my own steeping parameters!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cs1MzSdx_Ka/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLRuporGK4Q

beerandbeancurd

This sounds intriguing.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

#SVTTB Round Two – Tea 9/???

I’m basically working towards trying all of the Plum Deluxe blends in the box, since it’s harder to get my hands on them here in Canada. The idea behind this one intrigued me; strawberry and bergamot got well together so I could see cranberry being comparable.

Personally I thought the bergamot itself was pretty light handed, but maybe that was for the best because it let the bright, tart red fruit note pop enough to be quite distinct among the black tea. It kind of gave me loose Monk’s Blend vibes, with the black tea and grenadine combo. So, I suppose, bordering a little on more just “red fruit” versus cranberry specifically. I liked it, though! Not enough to keep it, but it was a fun spin on Earl Grey that I’m pleased to have tried.

I think I’ve said it here on Steepster before, but some of my favourite teas to work on myself and to try from others are these “twists” on such established, classic teas where it feels like so many routes have already been explored. It’s cool to see all the different ways tea companies put their own stamps on those types of teas.

AJRimmer

They emailed me about this one today, and I definitely need to try it!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

95
drank Vanilla Nut by Teeccino
1146 tasting notes

Sipdown, and a favorite bagged tea for ashmanra’s sipdown challenge! Made this as an oat milk latte while I got started on my Taiwan scrapbook. I’m not generally a scrapbook person but am making an effort for this trip so we’ll have something special to treasure and remember it by. Plus, since the trip was so heavily tea-themed, I get to use one of my Tea Thoughts journals for it and a lot of my extremely specific washi tape. The whole concept is just very cutesy but it pleases me. Tea itself remains delicious – creamy vanilla to the last drop, both hot when I started and cold by the time I finished.

gmathis

Washi tape makes me happy. You found tea themed tape?

Kaylee

Tea Thoughts sells a whole variety!

ashmanra

Ha! This was going to be my pick for favorite tea bag, too! It probably still will be because I hardly have any tea bags at all except for samples.

I am deffo heading over to check out the washi tape.

Kaylee

Can attest that everything is adorable and good quality, customer service is excellent, plus there’s a sale right now!

gmathis

Oh, my goodness … just looked at the stationery shop … !!!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

#SVTTB Round Two – Tea 8/???

Cold Brew!

I’m so inundated with tea samples right now from the TTB, tea orders, and my vacation so it’s going to be an interesting balance of what to drink the next few weeks. I do want to get the box ready to ship out fairly soon though, so I’m trying to make sure I’m getting in the teas I earmarked to try.

I though this one was pretty disappointing, especially compared to the perfectly solid orange flavoured black tea I tried from this same company. It was very, very lightly flavoured with just a hint of strawberry alongside a really neutral standard black tea blending base. Smooth and easy enough to sip on (and better than just cold water), but certainly lacking anything distinct to the taste. Never would have been able to blindly identify this as strawberry – it was just that light.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

drank Pomegrateful by DAVIDsTEA
15575 tasting notes

Brewed this one up last night to sip on while I was working on all my vacation tasting notes. I kind of got lost in the writing, so I ended up drinking the bulk of the mug while it was cool. Sweet, jammy and dense – like a thumbprint cookie with A LOT of the jam filling, but still a wee bit of hibiscus brightness at the start of the sip. More general red fruit than pomegranate specifically.

Friendly reminder that I do not numerically rate DAVIDsTEA blends as I’m currently employed there and it would be an obvious conflict of interest. Any blends you see with numerical ratings were rated prior to my employment there. These reviews are a reflection of my personal thoughts and feelings regarding the teas, and not the company’s.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

Huge thanks to Courtney for sending me a sample of this! I absolutely love it. This blend reminds me, favorably, of Alice’s Tea Cup Alice’s Tea. That blend is black tea, green tea, vanilla, and rose petals, and one of my all-time favorites. The differentiator here is the bergamot. While I’m not generally a big fan of Earl Grey, I don’t mind the bergamot here because it’s noticeable but not a prima donna. Rather, it’s a team player that shares the stage with the vanilla and rose, for an overall well-balanced cup. Halfway through I added about half a teaspoon of sugar just to really give the flavors some extra oomph, but this is a very solid cuppa without sweetener too. I believe this is my first tea from Østerlandsk and it’s a favorable first impression!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

87

I just ordered more of this, so I figured I’d try and sip down the last dregs of my bag before my fresh order comes in. It’s so rich and golden tasting with ooey gooey caramel notes tinged with the sweet honey-like fruity notes of fresh figs and a heavy handed cardamom finish. Really unique – I’m stoked to be getting a little more!

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

Gongfu!

After getting home this weekend I steeped up the this white tea along with some of the teaware I picked up this past week for a soft, gentle session to ease into the weekend! This Shou Mei has jasmine flowers compressed right into it, so I did expect the notes of jasmine to be a little bit stronger. Though, upon inspection of my sample I didn’t see a ton of flowers pressed into the pieces. However, the sweet floral notes of this semi-wild tea are quite beautifully soft and fragile. Despite their gentle dance on the palate, there’s still a sort of lushness to the tea both in it’s velvety mouthfeel and the creamed honey notes that seem to get deeper with each steep. Even though the jasmine shifted into a more generic floral note after the first half of the session, it did take a while for the tea itself to begin tapering off – making this a really rich and gratifying way to ease into the rest of the day!!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CtCK3cyuP3K/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4lxhQqMm4k

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

Gongfu!

Snuck in a session with this Wild Blueberry Leaf this morning, a tisane from Georgia that has been processed as if it was black tea!! I have to admit that the dry leaf visual is impressively close looking and, were I not actively looking for differences, I definitely would have assumed this was Camellia Sinensis!! Steeped it was interesting as the liquor wasn’t as full bodied and tannic as “true tea,” though still more thick and round on the palate than the average tisane by quite a lot. I would describe the taste as subtly mineral yet sweet, with a fresh petrichor earthiness that made me think of rain water and dew. It was also fruity in a way reminiscent of wild blueberries, with their more subtle and muted notes and that sort of floral undertone – I quite enjoyed how those quiet (yet not dull) notes coupled with the earthiness. Made me think of foraging for berries in the still, quiet hours of the morning when everything is still cool and crisp outside!!

Tea Photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CtHwcTFOao4/

Song Pairing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqIAr4uOSwc

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

60
drank Midnight Moon by Churchill's Teas
2285 tasting notes

I removed the butterfly pea flower before steeping, but I feel like I can still taste some. The flavor is fruity, but also a bit earthy, as the pea flower usually results in. It’s just a little murky and bland, not as fresh and clear as some fruity blends can be. Yeah the fruit is just a little fake and eh.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

71

Drinking more advent calendar teas lately. This is like a tart fruit punch. It’s not special in any way, but it was pleasant enough to drink cold.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

72

Despite my longstanding dislike of banana-the-fruit, I am discovering an appreciation for banana-in-tea! In fact, I quite like this one. It’s got a nice creamy mouthfeel thanks to the coconut, which rounds out the banana nicely.

Flavors: Banana, Cookie, Creamy

gmathis

That’s precisely how I feel about banana in tea. Minus the slime and fiber, it’s a pleasant little flavor!

52Teas

DELETEless than a minute ago
I’m not a huge fan of bananas (the fruit) but I love banana tea (which is why it’s a frequent flavor in my teas) I prefer the fruit to other banana flavored things (such as banana candy, which I do not like) but on the banana pedestal, banana tea ranks #1

Kelmishka

gmathis — yes, the slime is what gets me! The texture is just so awful. Ugh ugh ugh.

52Teas, hahah, the banana pedestal! What an image.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

Cracked this open to enjoy while at work today. The black tea was refreshing and robust, i steeped it for much less than my usual teabag method – only 2mins. Sadly, did not get any citrus from the brew, I think the black tea base was much louder than the mikan dust. before I began brewing the teabag, I could have sworn that the mikan was sugar for a moment – that’s how fine the grains were of the chopped dried fruit. But alas, the black tea was much louder. Perhaps the citrus will come out more if I ice it.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

91
drank Raspberry by Lifted Cup
4170 tasting notes

Ashmanra’s sipdown challenge – June 2023 Tea #1 -A favorite bagged tea

Wow, I always forget how fantastic this raspberry flavor is until I’m drinking it.  It’s also always interesting to me when teas change flavor depending on the location where you drink them.  Water changes, elevation changes… SO MANY VARIABLES to how a tea changes flavor.    Gratefully, not a sipdown yet.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

80

Martin’s birthday countdown AKA Your Daily Tea Cup Advent Calendar

Day 5

Expectations: smoky tea, with some kind of spicy notes. Mulled wine? I am fine with that.

Reality: Mulled wine? Is Dutch mulled wine that different? Could be. But for me it was a mildly roasty tea with flavours of cookies and cookie dough. With spices and hazelnuts. Cinnamon mostly. Well, as a festive tea, I feel it is great. In this gray summer afternoon, it’s fine.

Flavors: Cinnamon, Cookie, Hazelnut

Preparation
205 °F / 96 °C 3 min, 0 sec 10 OZ / 300 ML

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

drank Provence by Harney & Sons
3226 tasting notes

My best friend loves white tea. She doesn’t love strong flavors most of the time, although her favorite teas are Blueberry Green from Harney, Hot Cinnamon Spice from Harney, and Chocolate Strawberry Puerh from Lupicia.

Other than these, she drinks milder teas. I got the email for the release of this tea from Harney and informed her right away. It was listed as sold out. I signed up to be notified when it was back in stock so she could try it and very shortly got an email that it was. I let her know and clicked the link. BOOM. Sold out. I signed up again. That night I tried to order it again and it was in stock! I got her tin and decided to revisit the site the next day. Sold out again.

I guess the combination of flavors sounds very appealing to a lot of people or the cocktail recipe I saw in the description must sound really good. I hope this means that they will consider making this available in loose leaf.

The flavors are apricot, lemon, lavender, honey and vanilla. What I taste is the mildest apricot that I have experienced from Harney teas, with zero lavender, a hint of lemon, and a hint of vanilla. I tried making a second steep and combining the two as a sweet tea for Ashman but it was so mild that I threw some fruit and ice in it and made him an “Icee.”

For my friend and myself, I made it hot and we both enjoyed it. After she left I tried to resteep the bags and it was drinkable – a light tea but even milder than the first time around.

Maybe I need to play with it a bit more to make the flavors stronger. Based on how strong their other apricot and peach teas are, I am surprised this is so mild.

It is quite good and I would love to buy it loose leaf if they make that happen, but be aware that it is mildly flavored. No punch you in the face fruit here. I am going to experiment because these flavors sounds awesome for iced tea, but it wasn’t strong enough for Ashman imo.

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

2023 sipdown no. 72

Freshly steeped, this smells summer sweet, like fresh nectar from a flower. However, as the tea cools, it just doesn’t sit quite right with me — that sweetness borders on cloying (as much as a completely unflavoured tea can) — I’m being quite picky here, but this one steeps up either perfectly, or in this weird way that doesn’t agree with me. I do think there’s something to be said for drinking this as soon as it’s at a drinkable temperature (as hot/warm as possible).

Preparation
190 °F / 87 °C 2 min, 0 sec 3 g 13 OZ / 384 ML

Login or sign up to leave a comment.

Filter