Tea Information:
Where to find the tea: Mt. Hood Vanilla from Townsend’s Tea
Where to Subscribe: Muse Monthly
Description:
As the only subscription box of its kind, Muse Monthly delivers a unique experience for lovers of literature and tea. Every month, you will get a new novel and a full box or tin of tea on your doorstep! So go ahead and curl up, let go of all your stresses, and enjoy.
Taster’s Review:
When I heard of Muse Monthly’s Kickstarter from a thread on Steepster, I nearly fell over in my chair. Muse Monthly has somehow managed to combine my three loves – Books, Tea, and Kickstarters. I was so happy to see them succeed, even more happy to receive my first box. I couldn’t wait to dig in. The kickstarter tier I got included the stretch goal goodies, as well as a three month subscription. This month is a great beginning; the tea is Mt. Hood Vanilla from Townsend’s tea and the novel is Our Endless Numbered Days by Claire Fuller.
The tea that comes in the subscription is a full sized tin (2.25 oz!) of Townsends tea’s Mt. Hood Vanilla. Which sounds absolutely delicious. I love vanilla black teas and I am always searching for the right one. I have only had Townsend’s Kombuchas and diving into their loose leaf teas is pretty exciting. (My man’s all time favorite kombucha is their Spiced Apple Kava,) Upon opening the tin, I get a heady whiff of vanilla beans and robust Indian tea. It reminded me of the vanilla bean scones offered at Starbucks that I used to be obsessed with. Brewing up the tea I discovered the creamy vanilla in the forefront, slightly sweet, pairing excellently with the bold and rich Ceylon tea. Although I would not recommend it iced, the vanilla turns a bit sour and candy sweet, harshly contrasting the bold black base. Mt. Hood Vanilla is an excellent tea to drink hot while reading about Peggy and her father in Our Endless Numbered Days, and a perfect breakfast cuppa.
The book is highly recommended from me as well. Our Endless Numbered days was the first book Ina long time that I have not been able to put down. As much as I wish I could tell you truthfully, I regret to say that I don’t read as much as I used to. I would devour a book a week if I could. Not so much anymore. I think before getting Muse Monthly’s box in the mail, I had 1 book on my kindle that I have been intermittently reading for about three months. I think that Claire Fuller’s story is a great jumping off point for me to get the ball rolling and begin reading in earnest. I easily finished the story in two days and began to wonder, ‘what else?’ I thought it was well written and an excellent choice for this ‘book club.’
In all, I would highly recommend checking out Muse, mostly if you are one of those ‘bookish types’. (As my father used to say to me) At first I balked at the size of the tea, I can really see it piling up after a while. Although, the price is right for the amount of tear and the book bundled together. The feel of carefully hand selected combinations is invaluable touch. I loved doing this, and cannot wait for the next two moths. This is an easy, and great way to curl up with a good book and an even better cup of tea!
Goodbye from LiberTEAS!
This isn’t a tea review.
Tomorrow starts a new chapter in my life as a tea aficionado. For the last six plus years, I’ve been writing tea reviews and I’ve loved this “occupation”. It offered me the unique opportunity to sample teas from all around the world – teas I might not have otherwise had the opportunity to get to know.
If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you might be aware of the fact that I recently ran a successful Kickstarter campaign and the purpose of the campaign was so that I could take over 52Teas brand from its creator, Frank Horbelt.
Frank has had several different tea ventures over the years. Recently, Frank realized that he wanted to devote his full efforts to his iced tea business, Southern Boy Teas so he asked me if I would take over the brand 52Teas.
I was excited by the prospect. Some of you may be aware that I used to operate another tea business: Life, LiberTEA & the Pursuit of Happiness, which was later simplified to LiberTEAS. I closed that business about 7 years ago because I realized that I’m much better at creating teas but not so great at running a business. So when Frank offered me 52Teas, I was – like I said – excited but I was also a little nervous. (OK, a lot nervous!)
So I talked to my oldest daughter who is incredibly sensible and smart hoping she’d tell me what I should do. I was surprised – happily so! – when she offered to help me with this undertaking! So we became a team!
Now, I don’t have to worry about the running the business part of the business. I can just do what I do best – creating teas. And with a brand like 52Teas – what an amazing platform! I get to create a unique and unusual tea blend every single week!
But because I’m back in the tea business, I won’t feel right about reviewing other people’s teas. I don’t think it will be an ethical thing for me to do. And it certainly wouldn’t be ethical for me to review my own teas. So, I’m saying goodbye to the SororiTea Sisters Tea Review Blog.
But, I’m not riding off into the sunset. I’ll still be very actively involved in SororiTea Sisters. I did, after all – co-found this blog with TeaEqualsBliss! This blog is still my baby!
As you are probably aware, we’ve brought on a few more sisters over the last few months, and you can get to know them here. They – along with TeaEqualsBliss – will do the writing, and I’ll act as administrator of the blog.
I’ll still be posting the reviews to Twitter. I’ll still be occasionally posting them to our Facebook page. I’ll still be around – I just won’t be writing anymore. At least – not here. But I’ll have my own little blog space on the all new 52Teas website.
So, don’t be a stranger! Please feel free to stop by and drop me a comment on my new website. Or better yet: buy some tea! Or buy a lot of tea! More tea = more happiness!
Sant Superfruit Beverage from Sant
Keep reading to find out how to win your own package of Sant Superfruit!
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Fruit Tisane
Where to Buy: Sant
Tea Description:
The fruit, Garcinia indica, is super. Its been used in Ayuervedic medicine for 1000’s of years to balance the mind & body. It has Garcinol, HCA, xanthones; vitamins B1, B3, B9, B12, C; maganese, magnesium, and potassium and 5x more antioxidants than Kale.
Learn more about Sant here.
Taster’s Review:
I learned about Sant Superfruit Beverage from Kickstarter, because they were running their campaign about the same time that I ran my first campaign. I was curious about the beverage and I do like to support people on Kickstarter since I’ve been pretty active on Kickstarter over the last three months or so.
But as I read about the beverage that results from infusing Sant the Superfruit, I realized that this is probably going to taste a lot like hibiscus. As some of you are probably well aware, I’m not particularly fond of hibiscus. However, my curiosity and desire to support a fellow Kickstarter seemed to over-ride my dislike for hibiscus, so I decided, let’s try it! Why not go ahead and give it a try.
It was another of those, “hey, what have I got to lose” moments. Of course, I did have a certain risk element that is attached to Kickstarter. So there is that. But, as long as the people at Sant weren’t going to abscond with my cash, I felt like I didn’t have anything to lose. And, I didn’t think they were going to send me poisonous fruit. I mean, the lady in the picture looks nothing like the evil queen that poisoned Snow White. So, I asked myself, other than the cash risk element and the risk that Sant could possibly be owned by the evil queen impersonating a real person that can do a headstand (impressive!), what else did I have to lose? Nothing, really. I mean, what was the worst that could happen? I guess I could find out that I’m allergic to Sant. There is that. OK, but what else did I have to lose?
At this point, I was starting to think that I didn’t think this out as clearly as I thought I did. But, I still decided to try it and toss caution to the wind. So, instead of a what have I got to lose moment, this became a “what the heck, if I don’t end up dead, then I’ll write a review about it” moment.
I decided to try this a couple of different ways. The first sampling, I hot steeped it. Bringing the kettle to 195°F, I got out my infuser mug. This is a 12 ounce mug with a ceramic infuser insert. I don’t use this mug often because the ceramic infuser has really big holes in it (it’s made of ceramic) and so tea can just sort of cruise in and out of those holes and leave floaters in my tea. I’m not fond of floaters.
But these pieces of dried pieces of Kokum fruit are fairly large. There are different sizes, with some being about the size of a slivered almond and others being closer to the size of a dried apricot. On average, the pieces are about the size of a shelled, halved walnut.
So I dropped four pieces of fruit into the infuser of my infuser mug and poured the hot water over the fruit. I let it steep for a minute. The liquid was a very pale pink. It looked nothing like the rich ruby color that I saw in the picture (above). So I let it steep for another five minutes. At this point, even though the desired color had not been achieved, my fear of tarty hibiscus taste dictated to me that I must cease the steeping process.
The fruit is now soft to the touch. It’s been somewhat re-hydrated, but not completely. The liquid is more of a blush color.
The flavor is TART! Adding some honey makes this a much nicer tasting beverage, so I highly recommend doing so. It has a hibiscus-y like quality to it, but there’s more of a fruity element to it. While hibiscus has more of a berry-tartness to it. this is more like a plum tartness.
For my second experiment/tasting with Sant, I decided to try cold-brewing some of it. I used my glass iced tea pitcher and added 1/2 gallon of freshly filtered water to the pitcher. After I saw how pale my hot brewed infusion became, I decided that I’d try a little more fruit to this infusion, and I added about 2 palmfuls of the tea (This would amount to approximately 20 pieces of fruit of varying sizes).
Then I put the lid on the pitcher and stuck it in the fridge for a few hours. By a few hours, I mean 6 hours. After six hours, I fished out the re-hydrated fruit from the now bright maroon-colored liquid.
I took a few sips of the infusion and TART!
Keep in mind that the longer you keep the fruit in there, more potent (and tart) the beverage becomes. So you can keep it in there for a little less time for a lighter flavor and less tartness or you can keep it in there for longer than I did for a deeper color and more likely a stronger tart flavor.
I made a simple syrup of raw sugar and water and I added it to the cold liquid. With the sugar (not too much, I would say about 1/8 a cup of sugar for 1/2 gallon of the drink), the Sant Superfruit Beverage is an enjoyable, refreshing drink. It has a really tasty, fruity flavor to it that reminds me of plums and berries – but interestingly enough, not in a hibiscus-y way. I’d take a glass of Sant over a glass of chilled hibiscus tea ANY day!
I doubt it will ever take the place of iced tea in my fridge, but I am enjoying this and I’m finding myself curious about some of their recipes.
Now, you’re probably wondering about that giveaway, right?
When I got my reward for backing Sant’s Kickstarter, I actually got TWO packages of Sant instead of one. I guess two labels addressed to me printed out so by a lucky chance, I got a surprise in the mail from Sant. Actually, I got two surprises in the mail from them because I was STUNNED at how quickly we got the reward from this project! I certainly wasn’t expecting to go out to the mailbox and pull out one package from Sant, but I got TWO!
So, I talked to Kim at Sant and she gave her blessing to let my lucky surprise be a lucky surprise for one of our readers! If you’d like to try Sant, I’ve got a full 50 gram package to send to one of you!
To enter, just comment on this review below! Tell us why you’d like to try Sant and while you’re at it, don’t forget to include a way to get in touch with you should you be the lucky winner of the random draw on Friday, April 24.
Want a way to earn extra entries? Of course you do! Here are a few ways to earn extra entries, you get one bonus entry for each one you complete!
1. Go to facebook and “Like” Sant’s page.
2. While you’re there, go ahead and like the SororiTea Sisters too!
3. And since you’re still on Facebook, go to your page and write about this giveaway on your timeline! Be sure to add a link to this review so that your friends can come by and read about Sant too!
Wa-La! Three bonus entries!
Now it’s time for some fine print type of stuff, but instead of making it smaller, I’ll just make it italicized: This contest is open to US & Canadian residents only. You can enter to win now through April 24. On April 25, a winner will be drawn via Random.org and contacted, and once contact is established, the winner’s name will be announced. If we are unable to reach the winner within 3 days, that winner will forfeit and a new winning name will be drawn until contact is established. To ensure that we get a hold of you if you are the lucky winner, please be sure to include the best way to contact you in your entry.
We Are Nearing The Home Stretch!
Please help us reach our S-t-r-e-t-c-h Goals! Please click here and contribute!
We are nearing the home stretch of our Kickstarter and we’re so excited that we’ve reached our goal and we will be funded. This means that I will be – together with my daughter, Amethyst – taking over 52Teas as of June 1st!
But we are looking to achieve MORE with our campaign! The more funds we raise, the more we can invest in equipment to make the business more effective. We also desperately want a new website!
We have about eight days left on the campaign and I believe we can go FAR with those eight days! Please click here to go to the campaign and contribute what you can. As little as $5 will get you some tea – and you’ll have helped build our business and help my dream come to life! THANK YOU!
And after you’ve contributed, don’t forget to vote! Right now, backers are voting on five new reblends to add to the campaign reblends, so if you have a favorite 52Teas blend that you’d like to see reblended, please contribute and then VOTE – let me know what tea you’d like to try!
An Announcement!
Hello Everyone!
As you are probably well-aware by now, I – LiberTEAS – am planning on acquiring 52Teas. At the close of the Kickstarter campaign, I’ll be busily preparing to get things up and running. On June 1st, I’ll be releasing my very first tea of the week! (If you want to know what that flavor will be, check out this update.)
I’m really excited about this new development in my life, but with this new development comes the need for a change in the way things are run here on SororiTea Sisters.
When TeaEqualsBliss and I started this blog some five plus years ago, it was my goal to be able to write honest reviews. The first tea blog that I wrote for had a ‘positive reviews only’ policy and at first, I supported this idea. It was my thinking that if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything.
But being nice and being positive aren’t the same thing. I realized that I could be nice without being positive. So instead of being positive, I decided when we started this blog that I would be nice but also honest. I would approach each product as honestly as I can, without being mean. I don’t know that I did that with every single review in the thousands that I’ve written over the years but that’s been my goal. What I can say is that with every single review in the thousands that I’ve written for this blog, each and every one has represented my honest feelings at the time I wrote the review.
And now that I’m about to embark upon a new venture where I’ll be crafting a new tea blend every week as the new Mad Tea Artist of 52Teas, I don’t think that I’ll be as objective as I need to be for the process of writing reviews once I start creating my own teas. I can’t say that I’d be able to be as unbiased as I need to be when that time comes.
So, I’ve decided to hand off the writing reins to other people who can be as unbiased and honest with reviews so that SororiTea Sisters can continue. Earlier today, our first review from one of the new SororiTea Sisters published, and I’m so proud and happy that our new SororiTea Sisters have begun writing! In the weeks ahead, watch for a whole lot more activity on this blog as we now have eight new sisters. I’ll be dropping off as the time approaches for me to end my time as a SororiTea Sister, but these new sisters are enthusiastic and ready to write!
Please take a minute to check out the Who Are The SororiTea Sisters page to familiarize yourself with the new sisters!
Thank YOU for reading with us – we’ve loved having you along for our tea journey!