Category: Review

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Tea Experience: Little White House

Little White House
Fort Langley, British Columbia
$30 for Valentine’s Day High Tea

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I must confess, this is not the first time that I’ve been to the Little White House in Fort Langley. I’ve been there a handful of times with parties as large as 8-10 and as small as 2. Last week on Valentine’s Day, I went with a friend and we opted for the special Valentine’s Day High Tea.

As per their Salon Cafe menu, there are three options for afternoon tea. The standard with their Crème de la Earl Grey tea is $22, with champagne (along with the tea) is $30, and the Alice in Wonderland tea (for children) is $12. Along with afternoon tea, there’s also options for brunch, lunch, and to buy sweets separately. I’ve always opted for the afternoon tea. There’s just something about having afternoon tea that makes me feel like I’m living a decadent lifestyle.

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Little White House is a historical building that was built in 1910. The house itself consists of the salon cafe, and boutique shopping on the main and upper levels of the heritage building. Parking can be a bit difficult to find in the area, as there’s limited street parking and limited parking in the Little White House parking lot.

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Oollo Tea’s Oriental Beauty

Oriental Beauty by Oollo Tea
Oolong Tea / Straight
$10.00 for 25g

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First Impressions

I bought Oriental Beauty at Oollo Tea’s booth at the 2016 Vancouver Tea Festival, back in November. This was one of the teas that they were sampling at their booth and I pretty much fell in love with it. The packaging that Oollo Tea uses is simple and effective – a textured card stock box with information on either end about the company is printed in metallic silver.

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The front has basic information about the tea, along with a circular sticker that lets me know that it is a dark oolong, direct trade and single origin from Pinglin, New Taipei, Taiwan. The back of the box has a sticker that tells me the name of the grower (the Zhen family), as well as when it was harvested (May 2016) and steeping instructions. The tea itself is contained in a resealable white, foil lined bag. The packaging overall from Oollo Tea is nothing short of beautiful – I quite like it as it is simple, pretty and (most importantly) functional.

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Oriental Beauty has dark wiry leaves, I love that I can see the soft downy feathers on the leaves. This is always a sign to me that there’s a lovely cup of tea waiting for me. There’s very subtle fruity fragrances in the dry leaf. It reminds me a lot of stone fruit – plums, apricots, with just a smidgen that reminds me of peaches.

Preparation

Oollo Tea recommends steeping Oriental Beauty for 2-4 minutes in 95°C (203°F) water, and suggests that it can be steeped five times. My initial steep of Oriental Beauty was for 2 minutes.

First Taste

After the two minute steep, Oriental Beauty is a nice light yellow. It has a fruity smell to it, which was expected based on the dry leaf smell. My first taste of this tea and I note the stone fruit flavours in it – plums, apricots, peaches. There’s a sweet vanilla taste to the tea that I wasn’t expecting, but it’s quite welcome. The vanilla flavour adds a nice creaminess to the tea. The tea itself is quite smooth and easy to drink, with zero bitterness when steeped for two minutes. I found that the leaves opened up a little bit, but not quite all the way.

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A Second Cup?

The second steep (2 mins, 30 secs) had the addition of floral notes, the same stone fruits, and apple. The packaging suggests that there are grape flavours, but I don’t taste them in the second steep. Overall, I did a total of 7 steeps (6 resteeps) of Oriental Beauty. I found the third steep had the richest, deepest flavours with the apple and stone fruits, the sweetness of the vanilla flavours mingles well with the floral. After the third steep, I lost the apple flavours first (in the fifth steep), and by the seventh steep I was left with primarily flavours of vanilla and plum in my mouth.

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My Overall Impression

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I loved Oollo Tea’s Oriental Beauty. I really enjoyed steeping the leaves again and again to discover changes in the flavour profile. From the unexpected creaminess of vanilla to the addition of apple and floral notes, I think this tea does incredibly well with being resteeped and it is definitely a tea to sit down and savour each sip because of the complexity and ever-changing flavours with each steep.

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The Virginia Tea Company’s English Breakfast

English Breakfast by The Virginia Tea Company
Black Tea / Straight
$11.50USD for 2oz

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The Virginia Tea Company has provided me with English Breakfast for the purposes of providing an honest review. I received this product at no charge to me and received no other compensation.

First Impressions

Much like The Virginia Tea Company’s Earl Grey, English Breakfast came in a cardboard container, with the loose-leaf tea in a wax paper bag, and it came with an tea ball infuser, wooden spoon, and 10 tea bag filters. English Breakfast is a fair trade and organic tea, which is a good thing to know. I like knowing that the people who grow and harvest the tea that I drink are paid fair wages (which is part of what International Tea Day was about). English Breakfast has a strong smell to the tea, almost malty smell to it like from an Assam, with some light plum notes to the dry leaf of the tea that are enticing.

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The English Breakfast that The Virginia Tea Company sent me was the $15.00USD version (2oz tea plus tea accessories). The tea-only version with 2oz of loose-leaf tea is $11.50USD.

Preparation

The Virginia Tea Company suggests steeping English Breakfast in boiling water for 2 to 3 minutes. The carton (and their website) suggests that the tea leaves can resteeped up to 3 additional times. I steeped English Breakfast in my tea pot in 100°C (212°F) water for 2 minutes.

First Taste

After the initial 2 minute steep, I had a tea that was a deep orange colour. The fragrance that wafts up from my tea cup reminds me of the malty flavour of Assam teas. The tea itself has a very mild astringency that just leads to a slight mouthpucker at the end of each sip. There’s zero bitterness when steeped for the 2 minutes. English Breakfast has quite a strong taste to it, with the malty flavour from the black tea base and deep plum notes that show up at the beginning of each sip. The tea is quite smooth and enjoyable. The strength in the flavour, despite a short steep, is what I look for in a good breakfast tea. The tea is good on its own, but me being me, I added some sugar and milk to it and found that it tastes quite good with being doctored up as well.

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A Second Cup?

I resteeped English Breakfast, adding 30 seconds per subsequent steep. I did a total of four resteeps (five steeps total with the same leaves). I found that the plum flavours were the strongest in the second steep. The third steep fared about the same as the second, although the plum flavours weren’t as strong. The fourth steep was quite similar to the first steep in terms of strength and flavour. For the fifth resteep, the flavours were very weak. The suggested three resteeps was a good number for enjoyable tea each time.

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My Overall Impression

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I loved The Virginia Tea Company’s English Breakfast. A good strong black tea is always appreciated in the morning, which is a great time for a cup (or pot!) of English Breakfast. I found this one did very well in terms of resteeping, which is shows the quality in the tea leaves. I found the plum notes to be delicious, and the malty flavour in the tea to be enjoyable. I might have even enjoyed this tea best with some sugar and milk, but it is good plain if that is your cup of tea. The tea and tea accessories version is a nice complete starter kit for someone new to loose-leaf tea, I really like that it’s a complete gift option, if you’re looking for a gift for someone.

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