January Hiatus

Hello everyone,

I'm sorry to say that authori-tea.com will not be updated for the month of January. I am going to take some time to ramp things up for February and March - taking a month off is the only way to make it work and to keep this blog going. I've considered shutting it down, with so much work, such an insane schedule and so much happening in my life, but I don't want to give up on a 2 year project.

Look for new reviews in February... thanks for the patience.

Apollo Tea Moon Swirl White Tip

Description (from apollotea.com): Excellent tea as evidenced by the white tip! See the spring tea leaves come to life. Lightly astringent with a magnificent green tea profile.

Review: I have been on a green tea streak lately, especially since I seem to have a ton of it lying around, and because I feel like it detoxifies my body more than any other teas. I've consumed most if not all of the Dragonwell I have, so I'm moving onto others, and came across this, which I received recently from Apollo.

This tea is strangely beautiful. Firmly rolled, shiny, with white tips, it's quite an interesting sight in its dry form. Once steeped, the water hardly turns a color at all, and the tea is sweet, grassy -- not bitter, though it needs to be steeped properly. I've experimented a bit with this tea, steeping a small amount, and a large amount, and I'd definitely go for using a bit extra when it comes to this particular tea. The flavors really come out.

I think overall this tea is simple, but it's very clean, and the grassy flavor is pleasant. This is a great, mellow, straightforward green tea with a unique dry appearance and feel. Steep it the right way and you will not be disappointed.

The Good: good, clean flavor, interesting appearance
The Bad: none
More Information/Buy: Apollo Tea Moon Swirl White Tip

Seven Cups Lao Cong Shui Xian (Old Bush) Rock Oolong 2008

Description (from sevencups.com): Shui Xian is a popular tea bush grown towards the edge of Wu Yi Shan. Due to its popularity, farmers coming to cut back the bushes to allow for higher yield of tea. The Lao Cong (Old Bush) Shui Xian, which is closer to the center of Wu Yi Shan have been allowed to grow over thirty years to create a smooth sweet tea with no bitterness. The older bushes create a slippery feeling in your throat similar to a good puer made from ancient bushes. This medium roasted tea has a dried date aroma that is milder than Premium Shui Xian.

Review: This tea is creamy and woody. It has a hint of vanilla flavor to it that blends well with the texture. It's probably the most mild rock oolong I've had in awhile, but can be brewed to desired strength -- I made a fairly strong cup and I think there's more character to be involved when this tea is not too strong. There is not a single hint of bitterness to this - it is sweet, though I taste a faint undertone of something chlorine-like... I've brewed with two different waters, filtered and unfiltered, and I still taste a hint of that.

I think my brain just may be interpreting this taste wrong, though. It's not really a chemical taste as it is one of age or oxidation. The tea has a clean, crisp texture that provides a perfect partner to the sweet, creamy flavor. This tea is strong yet round; musky yet sweet. It is not too much of anything, nor too little. Take care to brew the right amount, for the right amount of time, and you will have a very unique tea. Second and third infusions create a mellower, but just-as-sweet cup that goes down gently while maintaining its woody flavor.

The Good: delicious combination of flavors and attributes
The Bad: none
More Information/Buy: Seven Cups Lao Cong Xian 2008

Serendipitea Little Green Apples

Description (from Serendipitea.com): Sweet, tart aroma of fresh apples, combined with the light & grassy sweetness of Organic green tea steeps into an aromatic, gentle liquor.

Review:I don’t know why, but this is the third tea in a row I really don’t like. It smells amazing, the flavor is good, but it’s not really zesty or vibrant… it has good flavor, but overall it is weak – both the green tea and the apple flavor – and no matter how much of the tea you use, it doesn’t ever seem to become any more radiant or present.

This is a good tea for someone who’s looking for something really mellow, with some apple flavor to enhance it ever-so-slightly. I don’t think the quality is poor, it’s just not really what I envisioned… this is very mellow, smooth green tea. The only thing I don’t like is that it remains mellow no matter how much tea you use.

The Good: great light, mellow apple flavor
The Bad: would prefer to be able to strengthen green tea
More Information/Buy: Serendipitea Little Green Apples

Red Leaf Tea Kalahari

Description (from redleaftea.com): The Rooibos tea, or "redbush" tea of South Africa, is renown for its red color when brewed and its mellow, nutty, and sweet flavor. Rooibos serves as an excellent herbal tea, providing beneficial effects to the skin and blood, and certainly offering a sensational flavor for casual tea drinkers. When blended with sweet flowers such as the South African "Honeybush" plant, Rooibos becomes a zesty and refreshing drink. We have added honeybush, marigolds, and cornflowers, along with orange and peach and vanilla flavorings, to create this amazingly sweet brew. Served chilled on a summer's day, our Kalahari Blend will provide a refreshing treat for any family!

Review: I am not a huge fan of this. I think I’ve had it before, but I am not sure what it was called, or what’s in it. It has a kind of citrusy flavor, but it is not really pronounced. Maybe kind of a peach-apricot taste. It’s bland; honeybush itself is bland, and it is paired with bland flavors, making it exponentially more bland. I wish I could think of the name of the same tea carried by another company, but I can’t. In any event, I’d pass. For all of Red Leaf’s awesome tea, this is boring, and the flavors aren’t optimal.

The Good: bleh
The Bad: bland, flavors are not very vibrant
More Information/Buy: Red Leaf Tea Kalahari

Mighty Leaf Holiday Blend

Description (from mightyleaf.com): Our holiday blend is a festive winter chai. Indian black tea converges with chai spices of clove, cinnamon, star anise, and ginger for a robust, slightly astringent cup. Apple and goji berries give it a slightly tart, mulled spice profile. Great with milk.

Review: I am not a huge fan of this blend, to be honest. It has a unique combination of berry-hibiscus flavor (not too sour, though) and clove/cinnamon/etc. It’s fruity and has nice pie spice flavor simultaneously, but the fruit flavor and the black tea for some reason just don’t really work for me—you know how sometimes cinnamon has a chalky texture? This has that kind of texture and I am really not a fan, ESPECIALLY when it is anything but hot. Once it gets cold it seems to taste even more sour.

I will say that even though I am not a giant fan of these flavors combined, I think this is a great blend for people who really love the tastes of the holiday. Mighty Leaf did peg the flavors perfectly: the fruit, the pie, the cinnamon and nutmeg and cloves… the warming flavors of Christmas and the winter work very well together in this blend, I think for me, myself, I am looking for milder, more relaxing teas, instead of ones to be used as pick-me-ups (perhaps this is not true, as I love Adagio’s strong candy cane tea). That said, I think this is a well-intentioned blend, I just personally am not feeling the love for the flavors.

The Good: Good flavor profile
The Bad: Don't like the combination of tart and round flavors
More Information/Buy: Mighty Leaf Holiday Blend

Rishi Earl Grey Lavender

Description (from rishi-tea.com): The floral aroma of lavender is perhaps the perfect complement to the sweet citrus and full-bodied flavor of Earl Grey. Our contemporary version of this classic blend was developed in French tea salons and has pleased the palate and raised the eyebrows of more than a few Earl Grey purists. Earl Grey Lavender is handcrafted in small batches and infused with pure essential oils of real fruit and flowers.

Review: This is absolutely delicious. I knew I’d love it, as I think the pairing of lavender and earl grey is absolute, 100% perfection. Rishi, as always, has delicious tea to offer, and the added flavors are as of high quality as the tea itself. This is the best, smoothest, most fantastic lavender earl grey I have ever had, and I do actually plan to buy some after I get through my current tin of earl grey (Kusmi Prince Vladimir). This is one of the few teas – the lavender earl grey – that I occasionally prefer with some sugar or sweetness added to it… it is delicious and smooth on its own but I find that this tea makes a fantastic sweet treat. I say, at least once, break the rules all the way and add milk and sugar to this earl grey… you will be blown away.

Ultimately though, this tea is fantastic in itself, plain, or with added sugar/milk/cream/whatever. This is great, high quality earl grey that is not too brisk and has just the right amount of lavender flavor. If you’ve never before tried lavender earl grey, now is the time, and this is the stuff to get!

The Good: one of my favorite flavored teas done 100% right... will be buying large quantities in the near future.
The Bad: not a single thing
More Info/To Purchase: Rishi Tea Earl Grey Lavender

Naivetea Strawberry Oolong

Description (from naivetea.com): Imagine the simple happiness of being immersed in the smell of fresh strawberries. (more)

Review: I am surprised by how much I like this blend. I am not generally a big fan of strawberry, but the subtle, sweet strawberry flavor combined with the green oolong is really pleasant. This gets 0 points for creativity, but it’s surprisingly delicate and pleasant. I left this tea on my desk for so long that by the time I got back to it, it was cold… which I think is a better way to enjoy the flavor, as it becomes quite refreshing when cold.

I am still an overwhelming fan of the lychee and mint flavors, but this is an easy third place… the strawberry flavor is not fake or overbearing, and it works perfectly with the green oolong.

The Good: authentic flavor, sweet and delicate taste, great oolong as usual
The Bad: none
More Info/To Purchase: Naivetea Strawberry Oolong

Serendipitea Holiday Cheer

Description (from Serendipitea.com): Spread some Holiday Cheer this season! A blend of warming spices, festive orange peel, invigorating mint & a touch of Black Tea for fortitude.

Review: Reviewing holiday teas is a hilarious part of each year for me. Thus far, my favorite holiday blend is still Adagio’s Candy Cane, of which I ordered a pound and somehow received the wrong tea (no one said elves were perfect). Thankfully some other companies have submitted new holiday blends for me to review, and Serendipitea’s Holiday Cheer is up today.

For me, to some extent, “holiday cheer” is an oxymoron: my day job, as I have mentioned before, is at a ski resort, and I work through the “holiday cheer” everyone else experiences, as the ski resort opens its doors, slopes, lifts, eateries, coffee & retail shops to more than 5,000 patrons per day.

Holiday cheer? Don’t make me laugh.

That said, this tea seems to have been blended specifically for the aches and pains that come along with the cheers… the debt, the worries, the anxiety, the rush. With a blend of mint, orange peel, cloves and many other herbs, this tea is warming, soothing, and great for the end of the night, after the sink is emptied, after the guests have left (or perhaps before, depending on the guests themselves!) For me, this is a perfect tea for after 10 hours at work, after a 4-mile jaunt through the frozen upstate New York hinterland with my dogs, after the daily 40 minutes on my elliptical machine. This is the perfect cup to have in your hand as you begin to bid farewell to the day, and get ready for the alarm to awaken you at 5:40am the following morning.

I think, in all seriousness, there is a LOT of black tea for the holidays, there is a lot of clovery and cinnamonery and holiday spicery, but this is really nice. This is delicious, it’s soothing, it’s an end-of-the-day, mid-afternoon-help-me-God-I’m-about-to-strangle-someone relaxation blend. Hats off to the chicks at Serendipitea for providing a holiday blend to soothe and calm us all, whether from happiness or sheer frustration!

The Good: very relaxing, soothing, tasty
The Bad: not a thing!
More Information/Buy: Serendipitea Holiday Cheer

Mighty Leaf Chocolate Chip Truffle

Description (from mightyleaf.com): A signature black tea blend, Chocolate Chip Truffle black tea, is a decadent mix of deep dark chocolate chunks mingled with rich black tea leaves.

Review: For some bizarre reason I feel like a lot of Mighty Leaf's chocolate teas taste very similar. They seem to use either the same chocolate or the same tea base (or both). This isn't a bad thing... I think this is very good, though I like some of their other truffle teas more. This is extremely straightforward: black tea, which is quite brisk and strong, but broken and dusty... and chocolate chips.

I think it really smells more like chocolate than tastes much like it, but that's how most chocolate teas are; this is good, but it's not a favorite, though the flavor is distinctive, and the combination of the chocolate aroma and the black tea taste really blend well together. Mighty Leaf's truffle teas are fantastic, and while this is not a favorite, I do like it a lot for its simplicity but straightforward character.

The Good: delicious, great blend of tastes & aromas
The Bad: none
More Information/Buy: Mighty Leaf Chocolate Chip Truffle

Red Leaf Tea Immortalitea

Description (from redleaftea.com): Anyone who has enjoyed cooking knows that there are incredible flavors to be coaxed from the leaves of rosemary and sage. Herbal teas also benefit from these old savory seasonings! Rosemary, a herb with many beneficial antioxidants such as rosemarinic acid and camphor, goes very well with strong flavors like lemon, as does sage, another healthy herb with a strong tart flavor. We have created a blend that brings together the finest green tea with rosemary and sage to create a robust herbal brew, and we've sweetened this blend with lemon and rose petals. Enjoy this fine mixture of vital flavors, all designed to quickly bring invigorating, healthy nutrients to every system in your body.

Review: This tea is good. I wouldn't say it's amazing; but it's refreshing, ever-s0-slightly fruity, and the green tea is delicious. It is not very sweet, which is ok for this blend of herbal ingredients. The green tea leaves are rolled, bunched, and the dried tea has a unique appearance. The combination of two flavors: namely rose, and lemon create a delicious pair when added to this green tea.

I really don't have much else to say about this. It's okay. It's plain, but has enough flavor to be marginally amusing. I don't usually find green tea with this selection of herbs (especially rose) so it's unique in that sense. It's certainly not a favorite, but delicate, sweet and refreshing.

The Good: good flavors, good green tea, very straightforward
The Bad: none
More Information/Buy: Red Leaf Tea Immortalitea

Special Feature: Adagio Holiday Blends

Of the many tea companies that make holiday blends available, Adagio's are some of the most interesting. Though consistent every year, they are delicious -- and while I like some more than others (the chestnut, cranberry and candy cane are still my favorites), they are all worthy of tasting. Good thing you can buy the sampler for all of $11!

Candy Apple
Candy Cane
Chestnut
Cranberry
Gingerbread
Pumpkin Spice

Above are previously written reviews of the holiday blends. Since Adagio's introduction of hazelnut black, I no longer find any need to purchase chestnut; this year, I will be indulging in larger sizes of cranberry and candy cane (use a minimal amount of tea for candy cane, the peppermint is STRONG!)