Ahmad Ceylon Black Tea & Rose Petals

Additional notes: ICED! Just a quick note on this one iced. Really, I just dumped some leaves in the mason jar without measuring like I usually do! After two days in the fridge, the flavor is mostly roses and not really any black tea. Most people probably wouldn’t like the flavor of the roses without the black tea, but I’m loving the flowery goodness. It tastes like summer.

Another from the Traveling Tea Box! I have quite a few rose blacks in my cupboard but I am always up for trying some more. This one smells lovely, very strong rose flavor! I cold brewed it because, well, I was really in the mood for an iced rose tea!

This is nice, the rose is very powerful but not in a prefumey way and it reminds me of many of the rose congus I’ve had in the past. The black base is nice but ceylons aren’t really my favorite (with the notable exception of GMT’s Sinhraja!). I kind of think of them as the “default” black tea since sooo many blends use it. I’m sure ceylons can be very nice but I never end up picking out individual notes, they just taste like strong tea! I think that speaks more of my own bias and tea history (since most bagged ones use CTC ceylon) rather than Ceylon as a region.

I had half a cup of my iced Blueberry Crumble from Della Terra left over, and on a whim I mixed it with this. It went from good to oh my god incredible! Cinnamon and rose, mmmm. The blueberry couldn’t really compete with the cinnamon crumble and rose notes, but holy cow is that a good mix. I think I need to try out something similar with Blueberry Crumble and Amandine Rose!

I keep having issues with this tea LOL I made it yesterday to take to class and it smelled so soapy. But then eventually I couldn’t drink it because I guess I didn’t fully get the cinnamon out of the tumbler from when I made hot cinnamon spice. Meh.

So I gave up on it, but I really wanted to taste it, and tried again this morning. The rose is really strong in the aftertaste, it’s kind of interesting. It feels like otherwise you can’t taste it. The ceylon is alright, not the best one I’ve tasted. It’s pretty bitter for my parameters too.

I barely drank any tea yesterday because I had a paper to finish and wow hockey took at least three years off my life, what a game. I also had a growler full of ale I bought to make beer cheese soup. Beer cheese soup only needed 3 oz of beer. I bought 64 so I had to try some.

Now today is back to tea.

TTB-A sample! I had no idea when I pulled this out that it is apparently a combination tea and not actually a true rose congou (black tea scented with roses and rose oil)? In my experience rose petals themselves rarely impart a rosey enough flavor to keep up with other teas in the blend.

This is rosier than I expected but still relatively light for a rose black tea. There is a weird note to this base tea that I dislike; it’s one I’ve smelled/tasted before, but it’s not one I’ve ever associated with a ceylon. It’s kind of oddly bitter and weird in a way I’ve never been able to properly describe. But its there, so this tea is instantly not really for me. I think this also cements that I prefer Chinese-base rose black teas (really, true rose congou), because anything besides a keemun or fujian base just doesn’t sit right with me.

Another tea from the tea box!

The rose in this tea is lovely. It’s not overpowering, but it definitely lifts what would be a middle of the road Ceylon up a notch. The base tea has a bit of an edge to it, a tiny hint of bitterness. The rose flavor helps smooth the tea out, and it gives a fullness I think would be missing otherwise. Very nice.

This tea has pretty rose-amber color in the cup. THe dry leaves are very attractive blend of black tea heavily sprinkled with beautiful pink rose petals. THis is a very attractive tea in the dry leaf. The dry leaves also smell VERY aromatic of rose.

A pleasant rosy cup of tea. No bitterness. The rose flavor is somewhat muted. However, when searching for the flavor in the sip it is clear this is a rose tea. In a lineup of teas it is clear that this one is rose.