adagioteas:

Earn your blending black belt

Simply reblog this post for a chance to win all of the 148 teas we use in our signature blends. We can’t guarantee that winning will make you the next Cara McGee, but it will definitely up your tea geek cred.

HOW TO WIN:

• You may reblog this post once a day for the next few weeks. We’ll randomly choose a person on August 15th and the winner can begin rearranging their kitchen cupboards.

nox [potter blend] - earl grey moonlight, blackberry, chocolate - “dark and sweet, a basic spell that every witch and wizard knows.”

in the bag:
holy cow this smells good. definitely chocolately, and the blackberry comes through really clearly. it smells lighter and cleaner than i thought it would.

brewing:
steeping time: 3 minutes
notes: the smell of this tea alone could be seriously addictive. once it’s steeping, it smells like blackberry truffles. omg. i can not wait to taste this.

drinking!
hot, no sugar or milk: the earl grey is definitely the defining taste when the tea isn’t sweetened. there’s a hint of the blackberry, but no chocolate yet. as sweet as i like to take my tea, i don’t think i’ll need to much sugar to make this taste amazing.
with rock sugar: even with sweetener, this tea doesn’t become overwhelmingly sweet, like i was worried it might for people that don’t love sweet sweet tea. the earl grey moonlight is still the strongest flavor by far, and there’s more blackberry now, but still only the barest hint of chocolate. it still tastes more like tea than like novelty-fruit-and-chocolate tea, which i’m happy about. 

verdict: this tea was not as crazy sweet or chocolate-y as i thought it would be, but i kind of love that. it smells insanely good. i’ll definitely be drinking a lot of this tea, it’s smooth and very easy to drink. the more i drink it, the more i taste the chocolate. i’m definitely a little bit in love with this tea.

current rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

if you’d like to taste nox, you can check it out here.

adagioteas:

Earn your blending black belt

Simply reblog this post for a chance to win all of the 148 teas we use in our signature blends. We can’t guarantee that winning will make you the next Cara McGee, but it will definitely up your tea geek cred.

HOW TO WIN:

• You may reblog this post once a day for the next few weeks. We’ll randomly choose a person on August 15th and the winner can begin rearranging their kitchen cupboards.

yes pls.

oh hai giant box of tea!

i think the ups guy was afraid of my enthusiasm. whatever.

margaery {asoiaf blend} - vanilla, fruit medley, roobios caramel - “margaery tyrell. sweet, beatiful, and kind. i want to be THE queen.”

in the bag:
this tea has a very light smell in the bag. it’s definitely fruity and sweet. i love that you can see all the different fruit in it, too.

brewing:
water temp: boiling.
steeping time: 3 minutes
notes: i always steep margaery for longer (and use a bit more tea than i normally would when brewing) because i like it better a bit stronger. it brews the most gorgeous red color. once brewed, it always smells jammy and delicious - kind of like strawberries and cream oatmeal. i might be insane. i don’t know. it is pretty fussy, as teas go, though. if you aren’t careful, it can get bitter easily, and if you’re too cautious, it can be very weak. it definitely takes work to figure out how you like it brewed.

drinking!
hot, no sugar or milk: margaery is a very light, subtle tea when not sweetened. not bitter at all, but it doesn’t taste very strongly of anything. just a basic, barely fruity taste.
1 tsp. sugar: adding sugar brings out the lovely fruity taste of this tea very nicely. you don’t have to add a lot to taste the fruit, and the “tea” taste becomes stronger as well, if that makes any sense. i’m bad at describing things.
all the sugar: i take my tea super sweet, and when sweetened to my liking, margaery is even more delicious. very light tasting. the vanilla flavor is barely there - just a hint that adds to the overall sweet taste of the tea.

verdict: margaery is such a sweet, simple tea. the lightness of the tea is almost refreshing - a good tea to relax with, not one to wake you up. i also have a hunch that it could be really great iced, as it almost seems refreshing already when hot. definitely finicky to brew, but worth it. margaery tends to be the tea i choose when i’m not sure what tea i want to drink. i love the taste - the only reason i’m giving it 4 stars and not 5 is i wish there was a way to make the taste stronger without being worried about over-steeping it and causing bitterness.

current rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ -

if you’d like to taste margaery {asoiaf blend}, you can check it outhere.

this is my first tea review on tumblr, so forgive me for any formatting weirdness! i’m still trying to decide how best to do this. :)

ygritte {asoiaf blend} - spiced apple chai, ginger, gunpowder - “warm, spicy, and a bit smoky - kissed by fire. you know nothing, jon snow.”

in the bag:
this smells smokier than i would have wanted, but the most prevalent scent is the ginger. it definitely seems like it will be spicy. there are little bits of apple in it, which i love.

brewing:
water temp: boiling, because i’m a pleb and have no thermometer.
steeping time: 3 minutes
notes: once fully steeped, it’s crazy dark! while brewing it started almost bright red, so i was surprised at how dark the color got.  it also lost a lot of the bitter, smokey smell once brewed, and i can barely smell a hint of apple now.

drinking!
hot, no sugar or milk: nope. wayyyy too much ginger. sorry, world, i take my tea super sweet. this is not fun.
1 tsp. sugar: okay, now it’s drinkable, but it’s still really gingery. i guess that’s fitting for ygritte, but it’s not fun to drink unless you really love drinking ginger?
all the sugar: i wasn’t joking when i said i take my tea sweet - i probably totaled around 3 tsps sugar, checking the taste in between additions, before this became fun for me to drink. it definitely has a warm, spicy taste, and adding sugar brings out the apple, but the ginger is very overwhelming. this makes me sad. i’m going to have to adjust the percentages in this blend to get it where i want to. weirdly, i thought the gunpowder would be the element i don’t like, but there’s just enough smokey taste to make this tea different.

verdict: this is being reformulated right now. luckily, no one else has bought any, so hopefully it will be delicious the second time around. i like the ginger taste, but it just needs to be a hint, so i’m upping the spiced apple chai and taking the ginger wayyyy down - i’m actually switching their percentages, so this should become apple-spiced-loveliness. right now, it’s drinkable, but only with a ton of sugar. i might try baking some ginger-spice-type cookies with it. i can’t wait to try the edited version.

current rating: ★ ★ - - -

if you’d like to taste the newly improved version of ygritte, it’s already been updated on adagio, and you can check it out here.

more fandom teas! i love cara’s hp character teas, but i wanted to do some teas based on spells, events, and places in the potterverse. it’s currently a tiny group of blends, but i’m busy making more…i’m trying to test them all myself before i really make a lot of them public.

here’s the three so far:

halloween feast - the best meal of the year! candy apples, spiced pumpkin juice, glowing jack-o-lanterns. everyone loves halloween at hogwarts {candy apple & pumpkin spice}

lumos - bright and cheerful, to wake the sleepiest of spellcasters {irish breakfast, ginger, rooibos vanilla chai}

nox - dark and sweet, a basic spell that every witch and wizard knows {earl grey moonlight, blackberry, chocolate}

to see all of my blends so far, click here. i have a few game of thrones blends (tumblr post with info here) and two non-fandom blends that i felt like testing out. if anyone tries anything, i’d love to see a review! my ask box is always open for questions, too. :)

i recently discovered adagio teas (thanks to the amazing fandom teas of cara) and decided to try my hand at making some fandom blends of my own. i instantly wanted to try my hand at an ygritte tea, and decided to do a few other game of thrones blends while i was at it. i may do more in the future, we’ll see. for now, here are the ones that do exist:

daenerys - pale and soft. fire and blood. the mother of dragons is many things. {cream, gunpowder, blood orange}

margaery - margaery tyrell. sweet, beautiful, and kind. i want to be THE queen. {vanilla, fruit medley, rooibos caramel}

qarth - bright and luxurious and spicy. a trade city of many colors. {oriental spice, lapsang souchong, rooibos caramel}

the undying - shade-of-the-evening. blue, blue, blue. {berry blues, yerba mate, almond}

white walkers - cold. so cold, with those glowing eyes. three blasts means run. {peppermint, berry blues, spearmint}

ygritte - warm, spicy, and a bit smoky - kissed by fire. you know nothing, jon snow. {spiced apple chai, ginger, gunpowder}

i have yet to try any of these, though i’ve ordered a few. if anyone has any thoughts, please let me know! my ask box is open. :)

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Enjoy! It’s good for 24 hours.