Everyone where I work sniffed this bag and declared the scent heavenly. It smells like a tray of cookies. Nutty and sweet and a little zesty.
And it TASTES LIKE THAT, TOO. You guys. This was the Find Of The Week.
This is Mrs-Claus-in-a-tea. Imagine the prototypical grandma, with an army of tiny elf children assisting and getting the sprinkles and sugar everywhere. She is baking and listening to Jackson 5 and shimmying that caboose all around. Outside, the reindeer are watching through frosted windows. Rudolph is in the forefront, glowing like the attention-grabber he is. He knows that ol’ Mrs Claus can’t resist that round red nose. (She loves round red things! The nose reminds her of Santa!) She’ll be out with freshly-baked cookies for him as soon as they’re out of the oven and cooled.
Is there more tea like this in Fava’s workshop? I promised myself I’d stop buying tea until I wrap up the samples I have now… but I’m tempted to try a few more of Fava’s blends.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Puerh
Where to Buy: Fava Tea Company
Description
Hand blended to perfection this blend is the perfect compliment of earthy pu-erh, nutty pistachio and sweet citrus! You are my sunshine….! You’ll be singing as you enjoy this blend iced during the spring and summer months and hot during the cooler fall and winter months of the year. This blend has been described as a Pistachio Orange Cake with Buttercream…
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Downton Abbey® Mrs. Patmore’s Pudding Tea by Republic of Tea
- Unbleached
- Minimalistic (don’t use much material)
- Biodegradable (well, it’s just a thin piece of paper, and tea leaves are compostable)
- Chemical-free
- Glue-free
- Gluten-free
- Without extra packaging like staples, strings, or tags
It’s a very clever design and I really appreciate the effort they put into making eco-friendly tea so accessible.
So anyway. I steeped this tea for four minutes. I enjoyed the steeping process as well as the tasting process, because this tea gives off a wonderful aroma as it brews. It’s actually so good that you might end up worrying that the tea won’t live up to its fragrance when you actually taste it. It smells like an excellent dessert, which of course it should since it’s dessert-flavored, and creates the impression that you’re baking something custardy in your kitchen.
After steeping, it’s become a nice medium-dark color; it’s reddish/orange/brown, and the smell has strong notes of vanilla and cream. The first sip definitely has more black tea flavor than you’d expect from the fragrance. There’s lots of pudding flavor too, especially in the aftertaste. A bit sweet on its own (without sugar), and it’s very, very buttery.
With milk, it tastes like a custardy dessert in liquid form– it doesn’t taste eggy, though (which is probably a good thing, because who would want to drink eggy tea? Although eggnog chai is definitely a thing I drink sometimes, but it tastes more of spices than of egg fortunately).
Four minutes is just the right steeping time. If you wanted it more dessert-like, you could add sugar to boost the sweetness. But I’m having it for breakfast, not dessert, so I’m not doing that because it seems plenty sweet enough the way it is. Milk goes very well with this (and adds a slightly sweet dimension while also boosting the creaminess). Especially whole milk. I don’t vouch for creamless milk though. Anyway, the creaminess plays into the pudding illusion, so that’s another positive.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Republic of Tea
Description
This decadent dessert tea has the homemade flavors of vanilla sponge cake drizzled with rich caramel sauce. The full-bodied base of premium black tea lends itself well to a splash of milk, making it a perfect afternoon tea to partner with puddings, scones and shortbread.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Strawberry Shortcake from The NecessiTeas. . . .
This tea isn’t so much strawberry shortcake the food, but Strawberry Shortcake the character. It is so cute. It’s sweet and tiny and a little bit of strawberry for flavor/excitement. There’s a green base to this, yes, but it’s subtle, in the background. Because green’s good for you, it adds to the wholesome vibe of this tea.
It’s a GREAT intro-tea. I’d hook a n00b up with this any time to give them an idea of what’s possible in teas besides earl grey or chamomile.
This is a tea you totally could give a kid. Maybe not right next to bedtime (White tea has a little caffeine), but in the afternoon. Maybe ice it. Maybe put in a splash of vanilla soy milk to brighten it up a little more.
I don’t really want kids, but I think I would make a great grandma. If I could somehow skip straight over the kids-of-my-own thing, that’d be great.
I could teach a kid to crochet, to appreciate libraries, and to appreciate tea. I’d start them off with straightforward, sweet little numbers like this, and gradually ease them into the scene as they got older.
Every year, as I ticked my way into a creaky, pleasant old age, I would receive teas-and-yarn kits from my grandkids. Great little companies like the NecessiTeas would, of course, still be around. The NecessiTeas’ Robot Delivery Service 3000 would bring fresh tea to my doorstep with notes from my grandkids about how much they love me. They’re having a great time at the Mars Colony and will use Facetime Hologram with me when they get back to Earth.
What fun the future will be.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: White
Where to Buy: The NecessiTeas
Description
Angel food cake perfectly combines with a light layer of sweet cream and juicy strawberries to create this guilt-free dessert. Enjoy hot or poured over ice.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
The Cake Is A Lie from Geeky Teas. . .
The tea’s name, “The Cake Is A Lie,” is a “Portal” reference. It’s a PlayStation game in which you use your wits to survive through a corrupt company’s testing facility. You’re told at the beginning that cake will be served at the end of your testing, but spray painted messages begin to pop up saying “the cake is a lie.” And it is. The company expects you to die, so why would it prepare a cake?
So it’s kind of fitting that I don’t think this tea quite tastes like cake. (A LIE. Though I think they meant it to taste like cake.)
I think it tastes like that delicious crunchy sugar-cream glaze one finds on cinnamon buns, danish, or glazed donuts. Which is ALSO delicious.
I don’t know if I oversteeped, but I also detected a sort of coffee tang here. Coffee is not one of the ingredients. It might be a note in the underlying black tea. Or it might just be in my head.
Because when I think donuts, I think donut shops. I think about how, when we were in elementary school, when it was your birthday, your mom typically purchased enough donuts or cupcakes for the whole class. They got distributed at lunch.
I’d always follow Mom into the coffee shop to procure those donuts. And it always reeked of coffee and cigarettes.
Yes, it used to be legal to smoke inside eating establishments. And some places were way worse than others.
Bars and donut shops were the absolute worst. Bars because the smell would mix with skunked beer. Donut shops because the old guys who sat around drinking coffee at the counter would smoke really low-end cigarettes which have a distinct smell.
Smelling vaguely like coffee and cheap cigarettes all day didn’t deter me from birthday joy, though. I’d have that donut with lunch, and cake with dinner.
So really, I guess the donuts and the cake aren’t that different. Was the cake a lie, after all?
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Geeky Teas
Description
Black tea, natural vanilla flavour, candy sprinkles, natural creme flavour and natural caramel flavour.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
Baklava Black Tea from A Quarter To Tea. . .
I am renaming this black tea pistachio ice cream. Yes, I finally found it. My one true love. My soul mate. Yes, I know that this tea is supposed to be like baklava. And also yes, I do know what baklava tastes like because i’m Greek and, well, I grew up eating it. I’ve even had baklava in Greece. My yiayia (grandmother in Greek) owned a bakery back in the day and was an amazing Greek baker. So, its safe to say if anyone can judge Baklava, its me. Unfortunately, this doesn’t resemble baklava in my opinion. Fortunately, it does resemble my absolute favorite flavor EVER! Pistachio ice cream.
Upon smelling the beautiful dry leaf, I said (out load) “It smells like pistachio ice cream!” I could smell that sweet, nutty, almond cream, and pistachio goodness. You could see whole pistachio nuts in the blend along with rose petals. It looks absolutely divine and smells that way too. I steeped 2 tsp of this in 12oz mug filled with near-boiling water for 4 minutes.
Once steeped, I could still smell pistachio ice cream. This tea smelled like almond cream and pistachio nuts. You can actually taste the pistachios, too. You know when you crack open pistachios and there is that skin that they have? The skin that’s slightly salty and nutty? I could taste that on my first sip. After that first sip I couldn’t taste it again. But this just goes to show that they really did a great job with the flavor. I don’t get anything artificial or chemical, it tastes real and natural.
However, I didn’t taste the pastry or baklava. For me, this wasn’t an issue because I absolutely adore pistachio ice cream (clearly) and have actually been looking for a tea that resembled it. For others who want it to have that “bakery” flavor, this does miss that mark in my opinion. I really didn’t get that honey, nutty, baklava. Either way, it is still a great black tea blend and I think it would go great with breakfast in the morning or as an after-dinner treat.
Here’s the scoop!
Leaf Type: Black Tea
Where to Buy: A Quarter To Tea
Description
Rich Milima estate tea, with it’s beautiful malty pastry and bordeaux-like notes, is the base for the honeyed pistachio goodness of baklava. Just a touch of rose for a traditional experience.
Learn even more about this tea and tea company here!
