Tea Reviews

It snowed last night. A lot. I have spent almost an hour scooping my driveway, and there is still quite a lot left to do! Tonight it is supposed to be 1F, with a windchill of -20F. Have I mentioned how much I hate winter?

On the plus side, I think this is the typical Nebraska "last storm", which ALWAYS sucks badly. Next week it should be in the 40s and above, so we just have to wait it out. Have I mentioned how much I hate waiting? :)

Not much else is going on here right now. I'm still having fun with my wacom tablet. I have completely removed my mouse, and do everything with my pen now! My drawings are getting better, I'll put one up soon...

On to tea. I've had quite a few different teas since my last post, so I'm going to give "quick" reviews of them. I use the X-Play rating system: 1 is horrible, 2 is good but still has issues, 3 is average, 4 is really good with a few issues, and 5 is perfect or nearly perfect. And yes, I DO have all of these written out in a spreadsheet, because I'm a nerd.

Valentines: This one is a flavored tea, combining black tea with chocolate covered strawberries. I don't know how they did it, but it really works. Delicious! 3/5, but it lost a point because it's seasonal only.

Darjeeling #22: Black tea. Very tasty. It had a little bit of bitterness, but it was definitely good. This will probably become my default "black" tea. 5/5

Mango Melange: Herbal tea. This tastes a lot like Blood Orange, but it isn't quite as good, and I can't place my finger on why. 3/5, mainly because knock-offs suck.

White Monkey: Green tea. This is the best of the green teas I've had so far (only tried half of them). Very smooth, maybe just a little too subtle. 4/5

Ceylon Sonata: Black tea. Pretty weak flavored. This would probably be useful to mix with other, stronger teas, but by itself it isn't that good. 2/5

Assam Melody: Black tea. All I said in my notes was "pretty good", so who knows what I thought of it at the time? 3/5, because I can't even remember it.

Li Zi Nutcracker: Green tea. Eeew. It was... bitter isn't the right word, it just tasted... off. Almost meaty? 2/5 out of sympathy.

That's it for now! I'll have more reviews sooner or later.

More Tea and Fun With Wacom

Well, I got a new shipment of tea in today. I got quite the haul this time, lots and lots of samplers!!! I'll let you know how they all are over the next few weeks, but for now here is what I got:

Herbal Sampler:
Rooibos Jasmin
Lemon Grass
Mango Melange
Berry Blues
Peppermint
Sour Apple

Black Tea Sampler:
Golden Monkey
Keemun Concerto
Pu Erh Dante
Ceylon Sonata
Assam Melody
Darjeeling #22

Green Tea Sampler:
Gunpowder
White Monkey
Li Zi Nutcracker
Sencha Overture
Spiced Green
Kukicha

All those were "prebuilt" samples, no thinking involved! I also bought an 8 oz tin of blood orange (the little sample I had before got me hooked!), and they were nice enough to throw in a sample tin of the Valentines tea for free. According to their site, it is a combination of Ceylon black and chocolate-covered strawberries... Well, we'll just wait and see about that.

So, my first tea review of the new batch: gunpowder. First off, I should admit my prejudice. I love green tea. It could be the nastiest tasting tea in the world, and I'd still like it. I don't know why, don't ask. Maybe it's because I remember drinking it at fake-Chinese restaurants when I was a kid... So with that in mind, I should tell you about gunpowder green tea. It's not bad. Definitely not the best green tea I've ever tasted, and the price reflects it: it's the cheapest of all green teas on Adagio. However, it really is not unpleasant, maybe a bit astringent, and it's much better than nothing!

It does a cool little trick in the teapot too! When you first see it, it kinda looks like a bunch of pebbles, but after sitting in water for 7 minutes it gets all fluffy! I love it when my food/beverages do tricks like this!

Ok, enough tea chat for tonight. I'm brewing a cup of Darjeeling right now, but you'll have to wait for my review. See? I can build suspense too!!!

I finally broke down this weekend and bought my geeky wet dream: a Wacom tablet. If you've never seen one, they are kinda hard to explain/describe. It is a drawing surface that translates your pen strokes into computer code. That's not the best explanation, but just go with it... It makes my digital image editing (bet you didn't know I did THAT, didja?) a lot easier than trying to use a mouse. On the other hand, it's fun to use as a REPLACEMENT to my mouse as well, since moving the pen moves my pointer onscreen. So cool!

Well, I have to go draw horns on the foreheads of some super models... Have a good night!

Dr S