Compagnie & Co Day 1
When I saw that my local French gourmet food shop was selling Compagnie & Co Advent calendars this year, I couldn’t resist buying one, even though it’s one more calendar than I planned on doing. I’m also four days behind schedule. This is a special 25-sachet calendar celebrating the fortieth anniversary of their Christmas Tea. The packaging is very pretty, with each sachet having its own little red box within the big Advent calendar. I steeped the 2 g sachet in 250 ml of 190F water for 3, 5, and 7 minutes.
The dry aroma is of rich caramel, with a hint of the cake frosting Roswell Strange pointed out in a previous review. The first steep gives me really decadent, buttery, sweet caramel, with elements of cake frosting and maybe some alcohol notes from the flavouring. The tea is quite sweet and the caramel cream aftertaste lingers perhaps longer than I’d like. The second steep is quite consistent, with a thick creme caramel flavour and a small amount of woodiness contributed by the rooibos. The rooibos is more noticeable in the final steep, though there’s still plenty of caramel.
I enjoy my fair share of sweet things, including a salted caramel cheesecake made by a local bakery, but this tea was pretty sweet for me. The caramel flavour is accurate and totally over the top. This is a tea you have to be in the mood for.
Flavors: Alcohol, Butter, Caramel, Creamy, Frosting, Sweet, Wood
