elderberry tea, culinary teas

Elderberry Tea is a flavored black tea from Culinary Teas, which is a great place to head if you're on a budget, but don't find normal samples quite large enough. Their one ounce packages are in the $1 to $4 range and an ounce goes further than you'd think!

A sour grape-y blueberry thing.
Yum!

My first introduction to elderberries was, probably like many, in an insult hurled by the French gatekeepers to King Arthur and the knights in Monty Python an the Holy Grail.

"Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries!"

Now, lest you think elderberries smell bad, I'll correct this. They smell like most berries. Which is to say sour with just a hint of something sweeter. The something sweeter here is a bit like a cross between a sour grape and a blueberry. (Which coincidentally is the taste, as well). 

This tree is also part of the honeysuckle family and liquors and sodas are made from the sweet elderflowers. The reference being made in Monty Python is actually to the father being a drunk!

Coincidentally, the strongest wand in the Harry Potter universe, the Elder Wand, is made from wood from the same type of tree.

Now, back to the tea. 

The very first thing I noticed is that there are no elderberries in the tea. Instead it is a combination of  "Luxury black tea, Sweetened cranberries, Safflower petals, Blackberry + lime leaves, Natural flavors."  This struck me as a little peculiar, but in the interest in giving it a fair shot I tucked this knowldege away for a little bit.

Vibrant; just like the smell!

The dry leaf here is so pretty! Bright red flowers, wisps of green lime leaf and cranberries dot the dark, twisty Ceylon leaves. The smell is very tart, almost a lemony citrus, but it goes deeper than that. There's a sweetness to it, like blackberry and a richness imparted from the base. It captures the essence of elderberry very well, even if there aren't any present.

My elderberries bring all
the cows to the yard!

The tea brews up coppery on a normal 3 min 30 second steep with boiling water, and not as dark as you might expect from a black tea. The coloration of a 16 hour cold steep was lighter yet. 

The taste of both was tart, but not so much so that lips were puckered. It captures the sett and sour of an elderberry very well. And has a depth to it that I was expecting, where the sour touches you first and then gives way to a sweet and rich berry flavor. There a very slight floral quality to it that also lends itself well here.

The florals of the cold steeped cup were just shy of undrinkable. It's been a while since I've found a loose leaf brew that was so soapy. You can sugar it out to a degree, but it also ruins some of the brighter citrus-like accents. I was a little disappointed by this as I initially felt like it would be a refreshing cold concoction.

Overall, it's a good tea, though. The base is smooth and the flavor is really special in the standard steep. The lack of elderberries didn't seem to change the elderberriness of the cup. 

Culinary Teas

lapsang souchong barbecue sauce

Lapsang Souchong is one of the most divisive teas in the Western world with it's strong flavor and smokiness. You either love it you or you would rather get struck in the head with a campfire log because that's what it tastes like.  Unfortunately I fall into the latter camp. Even more unfortunate is that so does my fiance. And we're stuck with nearly 4oz of this tea. What's a girl to do?


Well, I tried to get creative.

So, having wanted to make pulled turkey sandwiches for a little while now, I decided to go ahead and rock this with a homemade barbecue sauce. Onto the recipe!

4 garlic cloves, minced

1 cup tomato ketchup

1/2 cup sugar (or sugar substitute would work too)

1/4 cup yellow mustard

1/4 cup dijon mustard

2 tablespoons vinegar

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1 tablespoon chili powder

1/2 teaspoon onion salt

Fresh cracked black pepper to taste

Hot sauce (like tabasco) to taste 

1/2 cup Lapsang Souchong  (1 tbsp Lapsang Souchong leaves & 4oz water)

1. Prepare tea using 4oz boiling water to 1 tbsp leaves and let steep for 2-3 minutes. Set aside.

2. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine all but tea.

3. Bring to boil and simmer for about 5 minutes.

4. Remove from heat and stir in tea.

Seriously. That's it. Quick and easy and really tasty. The smoky flavor imparted by the tea is far more subtle than liquid smoke, in a really good way. It has a richer flavor and adds a depth to this that I appreciated.

Posing in the crockpot with onions

So next time you want to make something that needs barbecue sauce, try making your own! My apartment smells amazing and I'm really happy how this turned out!

Happy sipping!

red dragon pearrl, thepuriTEA

Unblended black tea is something that doesn't run in shades of grey for me. I either adore it, or I never want it to touch my tongue again. So, when I find a black tea that has me gushing, I want more. This tea was so far into the former category, that I was extremely fortunate to find that I could get about three infusions out of  the leaves before they started fading.



Not chocolate maltballs. Do not eat.

The tea is a gorgeous chocolate brown with flecks of gold and green, tightly wound into perfect little balls. The smell was sweet, dry and malty and had a chocolate tobacco-like quality (chocolate tobacco is probably not a thing, but if you smell this tea you now know what it would smell like).

I steeped 6 pearls in 16 oz of 212 degree water for two minutes for the first infusion, and three for each following. While steeping, the tea had a sort of rich earth and caramel smell, remaining sweet, but less dry. The first infusion led to a burgandy brown colored cup. The first cup was sweet and had the slightest hint of cocoa and malt. There was also a slight earty tobacco flavor that rounded it nicely. The finish isn't what I would call astringent, but it has a dry quality that melts away nicely.



Two steepings in, the balls started to fall apart.

The pearls were still (mostly) together at the end of the first steeping, just starting to lazily unfurl. By the end of the second they were fully separated, but still brewed a rich golden brown cup. The tea still tasted subtle and the sweetness was more pronounced over the earthy quality. The third steeping was a caramel color and was similar to the second cup, only more delicate.

Overall this was an amazing tea and very highly recommended!

thepuriTea

giddapahar musk '09, thunderbolt tea

Admittedly, I did rely on the magic of the internet to help me find Thunderbolt Tea. But I absolutely do not regret that nor find shame in it. So, if you're like me and haven't heard much about them, let me just start by explaining Thunderbolt and how they work.

Thunderbolt Tea is a direct distributor of high-quality single-estate Darjeelings. (Straight from Darjeeling). The prices are affordable and the teas are superb. The only catch is that you need a $75 purchase to receive free shipping, lest the shipping cost as much as the tea. After $75, your purchase is eligible for free shipping via IndiaSpeedPost. Now, they said my order would take 14-20 days to get here...

Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised when it got here in 7. Not only did my three purchases make it here, they were also kind enough to enclose several small sample packages. I'm excited for these as well :)

The Thunderbolt site is a serious fountainhead of knowledge, so even if you don't feel like tea, or care for tea (why are you here?!), the back-stories of each estate and tea are still pretty interesting.
This one just happens to be a second flush Darjeeling, which are plucked in May. Second flush teas typically yield a mature and mellow brew.

Now, onto the tea itself.

Isn't it beautiful?

The leaves are long and wiry. The yellows, browns and greens present were all beautiful and smelled thick and musky, but very sweet, with heavy notes of chocolate, flowers, wine and wood.

I brought some water to just below a boil and steeped about 1tbsp in 16oz of water and steeped for about three minutes.

It brewed deep amber-gold. Quite light for a black tea, actually. ( Of course some time after I enjoyed this first (second, and third) cuppa, I learned that most unblended Darjeeling teas are not fully oxidized; and therefore bear more resemblance to an oolong in processing, thus this lighter, more delicate flavor.)

As indicated by it's name, the tea was musky, but also persisting were those notes of chocolate and floral, as well as sweet and nutty. The flavor here is divine and wonderfully nuanced. I don't quite know where to start. It was musky, flowery, toast, nutty, a little smoky, with a sweet floral finish that lingered and lingered.

I sipped this tea, really just enjoying each taste. This is a particularly flavorful and aromatic tea, and a thoroughly dazzling drinking experience.

To view the vendor's website, please follow this link.

This review (with edits) was originally published May 2010 on my original teablog, UNCERTAIN-TEA.