Chance Combinations

So I had a little left of the following two samples way-back-when from Azzrian: Buttered Cranberry Orange Scone Honeybush (that’s a mouthful) and Custard-Filled Maple Long John Honeybush (also a mouthful) – both from 52Teas. I decided to combine them to create one super powerful honeybush concoction. I call it … Buttered Custard-Filled Cranberry Orange Maple Long John Scone Honeybush TM .

And you know what? It’s not half bad. I’ve been letting this steep since forever and all the flavors work together. I’m definitely getting orange most of all, but there’s sort of this creamy undertone with it as well. I can dig it.

And the best part is, I’ve cleared not one but TWO samples out of the way to make room for other teas. Now I have to tackle the 500 other samples I have.

I made myself a homemade chai blend tonight! We went to the Little Italy market in the city, and I conveniently happened to end up in the spice isle..and the jar of star anise caught my eye. I didn’t get any for my chai, but I did get coriander, cardamom, ground cinnamon, black peppercorns, fennel, cloves and fresh ginger root. I blended according to Verdant’s blending recommendations on their site – blend until no one scent overpowers the others. I reached this point after adding a lot more pepper and cardamom and ginger when I put a bit too much cinnamon lol. I am not sure the individual amounts (darn it, will probably end up different every time now) but I ended up with ~1.5 tablespoons of chai mix.

For my base tea..I picked Tiger Assam by Andrews & Dunham..I know people might be thinking gasp, why would you put such a good tea in a chai?! But I wanted an Assam in it, and I am out of LB, which would have been the first choice lol. So I put in 3 tsps, after simmering the spices in 1.5 cups of water for 10 mins. Simmered another 2 mins and then took off and let sit and steep for 4 mins.

Then I strained it, and added a large dollop of honey (homemade too, my parents have bees!), probably a bit over a tablespoon. Mixed that around, and added 1/4 cup of milk. Brought to a low boil again then poured it in my cup.

The verdict? HOLY GOODNESS. SO MUCH HONEY. LOL. Maybe a bit less next time..I was a bit worried it’d be too clove-y, as that was the predominant scent when it was simmering, but it actually is pretty well balanced! I definitely taste the fresh ginger, and the cloves and maybe a bit of fennel. The honey brings out everything sweet in it, next time I will probably put less in haha. But it is sweet, cozy and soothing! Ah! And the base is there too, providing a bit of astringency I think, which goes well here. A bit of a burnt clove note too. Overall it’s sweet, smooth, and surprisingly well balanced, for my first attempt lol. Next time, less sweet things though! But I won’t have trouble sleeping after this, and will gladly slurp it down and head to bed! I think it was a good success, and I will definitely make more chai in the future! Excited that I’ve blended my first tea blend!

Just now I made Iced Tea for Lance, He wanted me to mix two for him so we mixed TC50: Uva BOP and TC54: Sarnia Plaiderie Estate BOP1 both from Upton Tea Imports here is link to both
They are both Ceylon from Sri Lanka just different estates I think.
The Uva estate is one of his favs for Iced Tea and this blend wasn’t bad at all, he likes it a lot.
He says it is Brisk and refreshing with very little astringency :)
http://uptontea.com/shopcart/item.asp?itemID=TC50&from=search.asp

http://www.uptontea.com/shopcart/item.asp?itemID=TC54&similarto=TC32&UTid=3510-22-12032504&afterCart=/shopcart/item.asp

Laoshan Black Chocolate Genmaicha (Verdant) + Special Dark (Mandala)

I wanted puer blend this AM, but all my blends are cinnamon ones and that didn’t sound like what I wanted. So I looked through my cupboard and saw the most obvious of pairings in the whole wide world.

So dark and rich and chocolaty with some earthiness to balance it out. I didn’t get the proportions quite right, but I don’t think I could really go wrong either. If you have both and want a rich treat, this is for you!

So I’ve been trying to use up all of my old black teas from when I had a black tea obsession. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy my black teas! It’s just that I don’t require them as often now and so I am stuck with a bunch of tea that’s fading fast and too old to give away. This, for this cup, I went straight to my oldest. Dimbula from Teaopia. I had gotten so sick of it at one point I thought it might have to be tossed (hiding now! ok ok, you’re right I could never throw out tea unless it was reallllly bad)
Anyhow… I might have come across a method of saving it! The answer (for me) is… CINNAMON!! yup. I bought me some sticks to play with… but I need to grab some powder as those won’t last me long.
Oh, I should also mention that I added a touch of Golden Fleece just to see what it’d do, along with milk and no suga’!
Well the result was pretty darn tasty. Not much depth compared to what I remember but I’ll take it! only one steep of course, which I expected. Which meant I made an extra big mug :D
Ingredients: 1tsp Dimbula, 1/2 tsp Golden Fleece, one cinnamon stick, milk
Rating: 85

I received my matcha order & decided I wanted to mix 2 flavours. Hello Cookies & Cream Cheescake.

So I mixed roughly equal part cookies & cream matcha & cheesecake match.
Although I definetly got some sweetness (didn’t add anything), I’m not positive how I feel about this one.

Neither flavour stands out & there is an almost alcohol tasting quality to it. :/ It’s creamy & dessert tasting as well, but not as much as I hoped from other reviews. I dunno, hopefully I have better luck trying them seperately.

So I have a tin of tea at church for when I need a cup of tea at work. It has genmaicha and I absolutely love genmaicha :)

Last week I brought some peach oolong with me in a sandwich bag to make. I had some left in the bag so I put the bag in my tea tin (without really thinking about what that would do to the taste of my genmaicha).

So this evening I made a cup of genmaicha and it was peach genmaicha. Surprisingly good. But not toasty genmaicha I was hoping for. C’est la vie.

On a totally different note, this is my last night on Steepster as I am giving up internet/cable until I pay off my student loans. You’ll be mostly seeing me post in the mornings :)

1 tsp 52teas’ Cashew Turtle + 1 tsp 52teas’ Double Chocolate Decadence

The last time I tried Cashew Turtle, I was underwhelmed. Which is weird because I LOVED that tea a year ago. So today, I decided to add some extra chocolate with Double Chocolate Decadence. You can never have too much chocolate!

As usual, I added a splash of skim milk and some Truvia. Mmmm, this is a delicious combination! I lucked out. Well on second thought, I don’t see how this could have turned out badly. One great tea plus another great tea equals one super awesome cuppa!

Chocolate is the dominant flavor, as would be expected, followed by caramel. The nuttiness is subtle and light but definitely not imagined. I’m really enjoying this. Yummy! What a great dessert tea! I’d rate it about 90.

I love pumpkin teas and this morning felt like fall. But I wanted something a little more creamy than the usual Pumpkin Chai from DAVIDsTEA. So here is where it got interesting, I added Pumpkin Creme Brulee!

I brewed about 3/4teaspoon pumpkin chai for 2.5 minutes then added 1/2teaspoon pumpkin creme brulee to it for another 2.5 minutes.

This was delicious. It was a creamy and more subtle pumpkin pie. With all the delicious spices. What a wonderful fall treat!

Since the Stash Double Spice Chai and the Twinings French Vanilla Chai were not completely satisfying on their own, I decided to mix them together and see what happened. I brewed the two teabags for five minutes and then added milk.

The combination of the two is pretty delicious. The spice is enhanced by the vanilla in the Twinings tea. The vanilla is actually more flavorful and less artificial with the strong spices from the Stash tea. I have been drinking these two in combination for about a week and I am sad to say that I have run out of my Stash Double Spice Chai.

This combination was delicious while it lasted and was a good replacement for hot cocoa. I’m going to drink my last cup of this slowly while enjoying the first snowfall of the year.