French Toast Dianhong

Here’s Hoping Traveling Teabox – Round #5 – Tea #49
This was the last one in the teabox! I’m not sure how Liquid Proust was able to get the butteriness, sweetness of syrup and starchiness of french toast in this tea. Whoa! The flavor is so accurate! We’ve got Butiki level flavoring going on here. And Liquid Proust Teas is so new! This was also the perfect base for these flavors. The Dian Hong is so light, barely an amber colored brew, that it can really showcase the french toast flavors. But I usually like my black teas darker, which might explain the lower rating.
Steep #1 // few minutes after boiling // 4 minute steep
Steep #2 // just boiled // 5 minute steep

Here’s Hoping TTB R5 #3

This is seriously delicious… It’s got some amazing sweet, bread, vanilla and cream notes to it and stands up very well to multiple steeping… And a splash of full fat milk makes this a decadent treat!! I don’t know if it necessarily reminds me of French toast but I don’t care it’s very tasty!! The moment this brew touched my lips I immediately jumped online to purchase some for myself but alas, it’s currently not in stock. Promise me Liquid Proust that you have a plan to whip more of this up sometime soon?? I must have more of this in my life!! Only one cup is torture!!

I’ve had quite a few cups of this tea and I found the first few to be very confusing.. but now I feel like I’ve developed a reasonably solid opinion to write a review.

The first times I had this tea, I was expecting there to be a lovely french toast flavor just bursting with each sip. The first thing that I noticed, though, is the rather prominent floral note. It’s a vague and soft background for what should be french toast and I can see how this tea would be a nice base for flavoring in general.

Behind the flowers, I honestly just taste a smooth chocolate and vanilla combination. Both are so light, though, and I just want something stronger to push it over the edge.. to make it really delicious.

I do like this tea and enjoy having it in my collection since I don’t have anything else like it. Despite having experimented with this tea at higher and lower water temperatures, I just can’t get any french toast flavor or really anything that resembles it… disappointing.

After opening up the Aged Oolong Sampler Group buy courtesy of LiquidProust, I looked around and sadly realized that I didn’t have an appropriate way to measure small amounts of liquid so I looked at the rest of the pile that has been patiently waiting for me to complete my move an have a day off. This one jumped up an down and said “Pick me!”.

The dry “leaf” (balls?) smell AMAZING. I get vanilla an bread out of it Brewed with boiling water with one ball for 2 minutes and 30 seconds. The brewed liquid is a light amber brown. I get faint vanilla as the scent. This is quite tasty. I get a bread like taste with a tickling of cinnamon.

Funny story about this tea, while I was waiting for it to come, my mom went into a spice shop and asked the guy for “French Toast Tea” stating that her daughter was very excited to try some an that she wanted to get some for me.

https://www.instagram.com/p/-W-cKnpnniy5qkIW0BmnLBzzbGHM6xiKwMbUs0/?taken-by=kkpeltzer

I love this. It is so creamy and toasty and warm…perfect for a fall day.

Thank you TeaNTees!

This. . .tea. . .is. . . good! Sweet, maple syrup, malty .. maybe even hints of chocolate? . yummy!

I might be a bit tea drunk from too much tea this afternon! Ha!

I continue to be unbelievably behind on logging teas (I don’t think I’m ever going to catch up…), but figured I should try to get a few new things reviewed. I just made a few bigs orders, and this was one of the teas I got!

Aroma was fairly floral, which I wasn’t expecting – I was definitely hoping for more of creamy, eggy vanilla (french toast). The tea, while being somewhat chocolatey and malty, also tasted fairly floral; not bad, but again, I was expecting more custard-vanilla, not vanilla flower. Possibly also a hint of cinnamon (but ONLY the barest hint).

Strangely, I did also get the “too floral” flavour from two other brand new blacks I had today (from Taiwan Tea Crafts), so I have to wonder if it’s my tastebuds or something (I have been sick for about 10 days, so it’s possible, though it’s mostly in my chest and I haven’t noticed anything else tasting different than expected).

Anyhow, I’ll withhold rating for now, in the event that it’s a problem on my end, but I was somewhat disappointed in this tea being so floral. I was happy enough with the base, and it wasn’t an unpleasant drinking experience by ANY means, I was just expecting something different.

Well this tea is delicious. Dang! I’m not going to go into all the flavors, I think other reviewers have covered that. Cocoa, malt, vanilla, custard, sweet, etc. Yes, yes, yes. I brewed an entire ball in my cast iron pot, water just under boiling, first steep of 2.5 minutes. The ball hasn’t entirely opened yet, so I’m looking forward to more steeps. What I really want to mention is that I decided to experiment a little, and I added some half and half and stevia to the tea. Like I said, it’s already sweet, but I have a wicked sweet tooth so it’s rare that anything is ever “too sweet” for me. Anyway, the additions took this tea up to 11 on the yummy meter for me. I would definitely purchase this again!

Side note: It would appear that as I write this, LP is out of this tea. I have a message for Andrew: http://i3.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/000/574/moar-cat.jpg

This tea is still one of my all time favorites. I have three balls left, and one to drink. I steeped it for less than a minute in six ounces of 192 F water, and I pour over this clear liquor glimmering transparent white gold. It was not dark at all and translucent, and when I took a sip, a sweet floral and creamy vanilla flooded my tongue with a cinnamon toast crunch cereal sugar quality at the back of my jaw.

I have a lot more to write about Liquid Proust’s newer blends, but that will be later.

I’m on brew two, and know that I am very happy right now.

From Here’s Hoping TTB

The dry tea Smelled like French toast, but the tea really didn’t taste like much other than a very nice Dianhong. I wish I hadn’t added sugar (I usually sweeten flavored teas, and figured French Toast should be sweet. It may also have been a mistake breaking the ball. It was 3 grams and I usually only use 1.5 grams per cup. Perhaps the flavor is all in the other half?

Resteep without sugar: Just a good Dianhong Yunnan.