Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Oolong
Where to Buy: White Two Tea
Tea Description:
Rougui [cinnamon] yancha [rock tea] is an oolong tea from the Fujian province of China.
Our Rougui is fragrant and smoky with a mineral finish. It is considered a medium roast.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn more about White Two Tea’s Tea Club Subscription here.
Taster’s Review:
I’ll admit that I have less experience with Rougui Oolong teas than I do with other Oolongs like TieGuanYin and AliShan. But I still enjoy them!
And this Rougui Oolong from White Two Tea is lovely!
I brewed it the same way I brew other Oolongs – in my gaiwan! I measured a bamboo scoop of leaf into the bowl of the gaiwan, and then I poured in water heated to 180°F. I did a 15 second rinse, and then infused the leaves for 45 seconds. With each subsequent infusion, I added 15 seconds. My first cup is the combination of the first two infusions.
And the first cup is delightfully fragrant. It’s pleasantly sweet with notes of fruit and flower. It’s very flavorful. Usually, the first cup tends to be the lightest flavored cup that I enjoy of an Oolong experience, and that may be true of this tea as well, but I like that there’s still plenty of flavor to be experienced!
Sweet! Hints of smoke in the distance. The wording of the description lead me to believe that this would be smokier than it is – but the smoke notes are faint – I like that! Woodsy tones marry with notes of stone fruit. I taste sweet notes of peach and plum with hints of sour at mid-sip. I also taste hints of mineral and light spice notes in the background. It’s a wonderfully complex cuppa!
And that was just the first cup! The second cup is even more delightful! The flavors have become smoother now. The sip is smooth from start to finish with a mild astringency at the tail – a slightly dry note. I also pick up on a slight citrus-y note toward the finish.
While I experienced a slight ‘sour’ note from the fruit tones in that first cup, I find that those notes seem to be tapering. The fruit is still an abundant taste, but this cup focuses on the sweetness of the fruit and there is very little noticeable sour note.
This tea just seems to get lovelier and lovelier the more you infuse it!
The third cup was sweeter and smoother than the first two. I can really taste peach notes now. I am still tasting hints (wisps!) of smoke. The spice notes seem to stand out for me in this cup, so it’s like I’m tasting peach and spice. Nice!
A really lovely Oolong! This is the first Oolong that I’ve tried from White Two Tea, and it’s been a wonderful experience!
Christmas Cookie Shou Mei from 52Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: White
Where to Buy: 52Teas
Tea Description:
If this tea doesn’t make you feel warm and fuzzy inside, you might just be the Grinch. With premium shou mei white tea, almonds, ginger, orange peel, cinnamon chips, a few cloves, marshmallow root and organic flavors, combine this tea with a nice crackling fire in the fireplace and someone to snuggle up to on the couch, and you’ll be in holiday heaven.
Learn more about this blend here.
Learn how to subscribe to 52Teas’ Tea of the Week program here.
Taster’s Review:
Yum! It’s no big surprise to me that this tea is already sold out! With a name like “Christmas Cookie” – who could resist, right? And it’s oh so tasty!
The aroma of the dry leaf was a little off for me. I could smell the spices and those were very pleasant to the nose, but I also picked up on a slight chemical-y note to the dry leaf fragrance. I hoped that this would disappear after brewing (usually, that flavor oil smell does dissipate in the brewing process).
To brew this, I used my Kati tumbler and added 1 heaping bamboo scoop to the basket and 12 ounces of hot water (heated to 170°F) and let the tea steep for 3 minutes.
The brewed tea smells warm and gently spiced. I’m not picking up on any of the aforementioned chemical-y notes – a good thing! It smells like gramma’s kitchen at Christmastime when she’s baking all those magical cookies that she used to bake. I smell spice cookies and almond cookies. I smell hints of orange. My mouth is watering and wishing it was eating cookies right about now!
And the flavor is delightful. I don’t know that I’m actually tasting cookies as much as I’m smelling them from this tea. I think that there should be more of the buttery, cake-y, pastry flavors that 52Teas does so well here. Maybe a tad more marshmallow root to emphasize the cookie aspect rather than the spiced aspect of this tea. As it is, it tastes like a mild chai made with a white tea base rather than a cookie.
I find that as it cools, the flavor improves a bit and the baked goods flavor seems to develop a little. However, it never becomes fully realized. I find myself wanting to taste something more “bake-y” – brown sugar? Buttery cookie? Pastry/cake flavors? Even a hint of icing might help bring the “Christmas Cookie” to life just a little more.
The white tea has a smooth and silky texture. It’s not bitter or overly astringent. It’s sweet and has a delicate flavor that is lightly vegetal (more like hay than grass or steamed veggies). I appreciate that I distinctly taste TEA here and those flavors have not been overpowered by the presence of the strong spice and other flavors.
Since this is a white tea, I decided to resteep it and see how it turns out. YES! There it is! That cookie flavor! This tea MUST be resteeped to get to that yummy cookie flavor. I even taste a hint of frosting!
As I said before, it’s clear to me why this flavor has sold out – not only is the name of the tea tempting but the taste is delightful!
Maple Marshmallow Flavored Iced Black Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Where to Buy: Zoomdweebies
Tea Description:
Why hasn’t anyone combined these two flavors yet? I don’t know, but I’m not scurred. Here’s our premium organic Indian black teas blended with organic maple and marshmallow flavors.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn about SBT’s subscriptions here.
Taster’s Review:
YUM! This is seriously good.
My mouth watered when I saw the label on the package. I want those cupcakes.
And while this tea doesn’t have “cupcake-y” flavors to it, it definitely has the maple and the marshmallow! These flavors are strong and very well-defined. And even though they are really strong, I still taste plenty of black tea flavor too.
It’s sweet and refreshing. It’s something that tastes so good that you’d swear you’re cheating on your diet when you drink it, but you aren’t! It’s iced tea! It only TASTES indulgent.
This is one of the best flavors I’ve tasted from SBT thus far. This might even be better than my lime favorites (Lime Cola and Lime Jello).
If you’re one who doesn’t like sweet flavors – this tea probably won’t be to your liking. But for the rest of us, seriously, you’ve got to try this. It’s so good.
AND Southern Boy Teas has a new Kickstarter Campaign going. Please take a moment and check out the campaign and if you can, please consider contributing to this small business!
Peaches & Cream Iced Green Tea from Southern Boy Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Zoomdweebies
Tea Description:
Premium Organic green tea with organic flavors.
Learn more about this tea here.
Learn more about how to subscribe to Southern Boy Teas here.
Taster’s Review:
I had high hopes for this particular flavor of iced tea from Southern Boy Teas. The idea of a Peaches & Cream iced green tea sounded oh so yummy!
Unfortunately, I don’t get a strong peach or cream flavor from this one. Not while it’s cold, anyway. I found that after the tea came to room temperature, rather than cold, right out of the fridge, the flavors developed a little bit.
Which was kind of a disappointment, because hey, let’s face it, we drink iced tea because we’re looking for a chilled beverage, right?
The green tea is a light tasting green tea with soft buttery notes. These buttery notes do accentuate the cream flavor, but only slightly. Slight vegetal tones to the green tea. It’s a light and fresh tasting green tea – enjoyable.
As I mentioned earlier, I found the peach to be very difficult to discern when the tea is served cold. I keep the glass of iced tea sitting out on the counter for about fifteen or twenty minutes for the temperature to get out of the “chilly” and a little closer to “room temperature” before I drink it now, because it’s at this temperature that it tastes best. The cream notes are a little easier to discern than the peach, it’s a soft, vanilla-y note and it’s nice.
It’s a pleasant enough iced tea but I enjoyed several other green iced teas from Southern Boy Teas much more than I enjoyed this one. Good … but not great.
To brew: I used the “hot brew” method, heating 1 quart of freshly filtered water to 170°F and steeping for 1 1/2 minutes. Then I poured the brewed tea into my tea pitcher and resteeped the pouch again, 1 quart of water, 170°F and 2 minutes. Then I combined the two quarts of brewed tea together and chilled them in refrigerator until cold.
Chocolate Frost Black Tea from Petali Teas
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Black
Tea Information:
Of all the mint chocolate teas we’ve tasted, this one is at the top. This is a dessert tea for pure tea lovers. The mint is gentle and the chocolate is natural. Think rich dark chocolate rather than sweet milk chocolate. Simply delicious.
This tea is available from Amoda Tea.
It’s also part of Amoda Tea’s Holiday Box!
Learn more about subscribing to Amoda Tea here.
Taster’s Review:
I’m trying the second tea from the Holiday Box that Amoda sent me. It took a lot of willpower to save this tea for second instead of trying it immediately, but because I didn’t get the mail until after my ‘black tea’ time in the day, I decided to hold off and try this when it would be more suitable for me to drink a black tea.
I have found that when I drink black teas late at night, I end up lying in bed awake and unable to drift off. I can drink some other teas without experiencing this so I’ve come to realize that it’s the caffeine level of the black tea that keeps me more alert at night and unable to get drowsy. So, I find that I need to stop drinking black teas about four or five hours before I plan to head to bed.
But this is one of the teas in the Holiday Box that I was especially eager to try! Chocolate! Yes please!
And when it comes to chocolate teas, I find it difficult to wait until the tea cools. I have to have just a sip of what’s to come! So I took a small sip and even though it was too hot to keep on drinking, I could definitely taste chocolate and mint. Mmm!
This is very crisp and minty. A bit more minty than it is chocolate-y, in my opinion. But there is a nice amount of chocolate to this tea. If I were to adjust anything about the tea, it would be to lighten up on the peppermint just a tad and add more chocolate.
But what I’m enjoying most about this is that the black tea base is solid. It’s a strong background of flavor. It’s well-rounded and the flavor of the tea complements the flavors of mint and chocolate nicely. The chocolate is rich and tastes of dark chocolate to me. It’s smooth and has a deep, deliciously chocolate flavor.
The three components all work very well together and it’s a well crafted cup of tea. It’s strong – robust enough for early morning if you need a flavorful boost. But it’s also flavorful enough that it tastes like dessert. So it’d be like having dessert first thing in the morning and as far as I’m concerned, that would make everything right with the world so early in the day!