Cotton Candy Black Tea

We actually had this one late for a number of reasons.

1. As the majority of people on Steepster having this 52teas advent box are on the North American continent, I’m several hours ahead of them. In order to make sure that I don’t spoil everybody’s surprise by having it at a time which is correct for me but way too early for all the rest of you, I have decided to drink on the correct days (or as close as that can be managed) and post with a day’s delay.) Possibly this is silly because someone has to be the first, but there you are.

2. Husband was under the weather and having the first tea of the box, and this flavour in particular, seemed a Bad Idea Indeed. It’s not really the sort of flavour that settles one’s stomach.

I had already peeked at what it was before he came home, so that’s how I knew it probably wasn’t something we should have on that day. I have to say that it suited me quite well to wait a bit. This company does some pretty bizarre flavours sometimes, and I have to say that to me this is one of the more crazy ones. Even now I cannot imagine this as a tea flavour. I couldn’t imagine it being very good, at least. So frankly, I was feeling a bit scared of it.

And do you know what the truly absurd thing is? I love caramel or toffee flavoured tea, so I’m not sure why this, also a sugary substance, seems so outlandish. It’s sort of the same sort of ‘family’, isn’t it?

Well. I thought that it would probably either be horrid or it would be very nice. I hoped it wouldn’t be horrid. I hoped it wouldn’t be totally sugared, because I just don’t do sweetener in tea. For many people a modicum of sweetener in a flavoured tea seems to bring out the flavouring more. I have tried it a few times, but that has never worked for me. All I get out of adding sweetener to tea is astringency. It has certainly never ever EVER made anything ‘pop’ in any sort of desirable way. Even the smoothest unbreakable Chinese black can be ruined completely for me if sweetener is added. So I’m afraid that what I was expecting here was a cup of sugared black. WAY too sugared black.

Even so, I’m trying to keep an open mind here. Keep myself prepared for the possibility of a positive surprise.

Well. It doesn’t smell like candy floss to me. It smells more like marshmallows and dry milk to be honest. Given my misgivings about this as a flavour to begin with, I find this rather reassuring. It makes me think that while it might not actually taste like candy floss to me, at least there’s a chance that it won’t just be black tea with sugar in it. Because let’s face it. Candy floss is nothing but sugar.

After steeping it actually does smell like candy floss. Possibly because it’s hot how. That is to say, it smells strongly of warm sugar.

Sceptical Cat is sceptical.

At least it still has that marshmallow-y feel to it. I’m not a huge fan of candy floss, except when I visit Tivoli in Copenhagen. It’s the only place where I want to eat the stuff and that’s more because of the feel of the place than for the having of candy floss at all. It’s… It belongs there. In other words, I’ve only had a few times in my life and have never been able to finish one off. I can eat maybe half and then I’m done with it. Possibly this is also part of why the flavour in tea strikes me as so absurd. If this had been released on April 1st, I would have wondered if it was an April Fool’s joke. (Although nothing really beats the infamous Tuna Melt Green Incident). But I do like marshmallows and that sort of foamy sweets, so…

Right. Enough with the dragging of heels. I’m going to taste it now.

I’ll count to three and then I’ll sip.

One …

Two…

Two and a half…

Two and three quarters…

Three!

Tastes… weird. It’s not quite the ‘black tea with sugar’ phenomenon that I had feared, but it’s pretty close. Neither as it candy floss. Even less is it those marshmallows I keep smelling. I don’t know what this is, but it’s not something I’m sorry I missed out on. To me, this is just some sort of generic sweetness, complete with accompanying astringency and stickyness, although not much this time.

I feel I ought to attempt to analyse the flavour like I normally try to do, but all I’m getting here is ‘sweet black tea’. That’s it. That’s all. I tried, I really did.

This was not for me, although I suspected as much already when I saw what it was. At least it wasn’t at all as vile as I had feared. This, although, not really to my tastes at all, is at least drinkable. And I would still rather have this than real candy floss.

Seems I’m the odd woman out on this one.

Last night, I received a request to try this tea. “I’m eager to know what you think of the new black tea base” said this request. So, I was happy to go a bit out of order and try this one. I confess that way behind in sampling my teas of the week from 52Teas … what can I say? I have so many teas to try and not enough palates or bladder space to drink them all at once.

After allowing it to cool a few moments, I took a sip, sort of casually, almost aimlessly, and my first reaction was “wow, this is a really good black tea.” Without even taking a moment to consider that this was a flavored tea, I started thinking of this as a magnificent black tea that is sweet, almost caramel-y, rich, and full-flavored. I started thinking of other “pure” black teas that are similar to this. Then I sort of shook my head when I realized that this is a flavored black tea, not some high quality, tippy, pure black.

This reaction, in my opinion, is the highest praise a tea lover can bestow upon a flavored tea, because more often than not, flavored teas are about the flavor and not so much about the tea underneath it all. Here, black tea and flavor have united seamlessly, with the flavor of cotton candy (and yes, I definitely DO taste cotton candy) highlighting the black tea in such a way as it essentially becomes a component of the tea and not an addition of flavor, if that makes sense.

And I think that this new base has everything to do with that. And let me examine this newly crafted, 52Teas’ base. It is bold and rich … much more well-rounded than 52Teas previous black tea base. The background flavor is SOLID and invigorating. It is robust and flavorful: sweet, malty and has a rich, bake-y kind of background to it, reminding me quite a bit of a Fujian black tea in many ways. And this is a very good thing, indeed.

When compared to the previous blend that 52Teas has used, this one is less astringent, and without bitterness. I do not need to come up with different parameters to brew it, I can brew this just the way I’d brew other black teas: 2 1/2 minutes in boiling water in my Breville. I don’t have to adjust the temperature or the brew time to assuage the black tea base the way I used to with other 52Teas.

Frank, you’ve crafted an excellent base here. I am very pleased, and so look forward to trying your future blends with this base (particularly my double chocolate decadence)! But for now, I this one deserves high marks!

Limited edition? WHY.

When I run out of this tea, I seriously think my life will end.**

:(

A real review when I’m not about to be kicked off the computer.

**No, not really.

I got this tea what seems like a very long time ago, and I still haven’t tried it! I try not to dip into my 52teas that often since I know I can’t get them again once they’re gone for the most part, and I just knew I would love this tea which made me even more hesitant to try it. I don’t want to love it, I want to think “oh it’s good but I can live without it.”

Well, this is a tea I can’t live without. I cold-brewed it overnight, and sweet gods of cotton candy is it perfect. At first it’s just a very nice iced tea, the black base really shines and is wonderfully layered but not too heavy. Then, BAM, cotton candy. It’s not fake or artificial, it seriously tastes like cotton candy jut melted in your mouth. And the taste lingers, filling you with giddy childhood memories of eating cotton candy at the county fair and then running around in the petting zoo on a sugar high. It is SO good, I can’t really imagine this tea hot but iced it’s…. urgh, so amazingly perfect. Thank god they’ve added iced tea bags of this, though I think I could drink a pitcher of this every day which would put me in serious tea-debt!

There’s only one thing I would add to this blend: I wish it was blue! I’m tempted to put some food dye in mine just to make it that much more like liquid cotton candy.

I used 1.25 tablespoons of dry leaf for 375 ml of water.

The dry leaf smells overwhelmingly like freshly spun cotton candy.

The brewed tea has a definite cotton candy aroma which is overpowered by the scent of black tea.

Too much astringency from the black tea base. I might have to experiment with the infusion parameters. A delightful cotton candy flavour is present in the background- it seems quite authentic as well.

As the tea cools I am getting a lemony taste from the black tea base. The bitterness backs off a little bit but the cup is slightly too bitter to enjoy.

As the tea cools further, the bitterness backs off even more. I’m starting to detect a creamy taste. There is still a bit of a bitter edge but it is quite enjoyable.

Second infusion at 3 minutes and 30 seconds. Lighter tasting but there is still enough cotton candy sugary taste to make it an enjoyable experience. There is only a slight bitterness that I experienced in the first cup.

This tea would not likely do well past the second infusion.

I might try only 1 tablespoon for 375 ml of water in the future.

First off, thanks for the sample Azzrian!! I so badly wanted to try this out and feel uber grateful to have the chance!
Now on to the tea… Hmmm, I’m not sure about this one. I think it’s one of those cases where there was so much hype about everyone loving it that my expectations are higher than normal. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great tea and I totally get the cotton candy association… but the “candy” part is a bit weak for my tastes. Maybe I should have used more leaf? (I thought I was being generous with my tea/water ratio!) or perhaps this would go better iced. Second steep, I added a dab of agave and it was a bit better. Oh well, it’s still very good!!! holding the rating til I try this iced. at this point though, I’d give it an 84.

So glad Steepster is working again this afternoon. Wrote this in the morning:

YAY! The 12 days before Christmas is finally here which means…52Teas 12 Days of Christmas!!!

Did you know that the actual 12 days of Christmas are the 12 days after Christmas that lead to Epiphany? It’s the day we celebrate the arrival of the wise men as well as the baptism of Jesus. Pretty cool.

But anywho, the tea for Day 1 is Cotton Candy black tea :) Cotton Candy is my favorite fair food and can’t get enough of it. My family did Thanksgiving at Golden Coral this year and they now have cotton candy. Sadly, they didn’t make much of it. I joked (maybe) that my whole dinner was going to be cotton candy. This definitely tastes like cotton candy. I added sugar because cotton candy is spun sugar :) YUM! Taking some to my friend Kim this morning. Sharing this tea was my Christmas gift for her. She’s on Steepster now! She’s a beautiful writer so I can’t wait to see what she has to say about the teas she tastes.

Sipdown (210)!

In and right back out ;)

This one comes from VariaTEA! I know she had troubles finding the Cotton Candy, so I’m hoping I don’t encounter the same issue. Dry, this does smell a little like cotton candy, although it’s a very light smell.

My parameters were the whole sample in 8 oz. of just under boiling water, steeped for two minutes and thirty seconds. Steeped up, this just smells like the 52Teas black base.

As far as the taste goes, I’m kind of alternating between “52Teas black base” and “Very generic sweet tea with cotton candy(ish) aftertaste” between sips. I’m not totally sure if I really like it, and I don’t like that the flavouring I am getting (albeit quite genericly sweet) is so sporadic. So I suppose I am having the same problem that VariaTEA had.

I don’t know – I’d like to try it again to see if I could make it taste better, but based on this cup I definitely wouldn’t want to pay for any, let alone a full pouch. Oh well, you can’t love them all and I’m thankful for the chance to try it!

EDIT: As it cooled, the generic sweetness and light cotton candy flavoring got a little more consistent.

This one is ok. I think I’ll like it more cold brewed or as an iced tea. That said, my kids love it. They were just about giddy to have it in their cups. Both of them said it tasted just like cotton candy. To me it just tasted like sweet tea. It does have a nice strong base tea that I appreciate. The Assam lends body and strength that helps balance out the sweetness. Thanks to VariaTEA’s generous swap I have plenty left, so I’ll keep playing around with this one.

i got this gracious sample from CHAroma. thank you kindly.

i have to be the odd man out on this one… i loved the smell, but one way or another the smell did not translate to taste. the tea overpowered the taste and all the cotton candy smell dissolved.

it’s a distinct possibility that this was operator error, but i don’t have any left for a do-over. no number, not when i can’t back up my result.

… … … it smelled great!