Merry Christmas everyone! If I’ve done this right, this post will be going out on Christmas Even and I hope that you’re all enjoying the festive spirit. I’ll be having a sort-of break from tomorrow to the 29th – I’ll be off for Christmas, in camp for the 26th to 27th, and will then be at my cousin’s wedding on the 28th! It’s going to be a busy end to the year and I’m already missing the daily boost of sugar and caffeine that the advent calendars gave me, but I’m also glad that I no longer have to stress about finishing the brews on the correct day.

Tea Advent (Reviews for the Last Time)

If you missed the first two weeks, here are my reviews of the teas (and hot chocolates) that I had: Week 1 and Week 2.

Day 15: Frosted Fruit – A light, fruity and Christmas spice-flavoured tea that ended up going pretty well with cookies. I couldn’t help but think that it was similar to some of the other spice teas, though.

Day 16: Toffee Apple – Smelled like caramel, but the tea was more tart than sweet. It was similar to Cranberry Apple (Day 4) but better because there wasn’t a weird woody note.

Day 17: Pear Cinnabon – After Vanilla Cinnabun (Day 1), I had pretty high hopes for this. But unfortunately, I did not get the Cinnabon feels from this one – I did, however, get a fruity note. I also wished for a slightly more prominent rooibos note.

Day 18: Cinnaple Green – This smelled promising. In terms of taste, it wasn’t as fruity as I expected but it didn’t have the smoky notes of Maple Kind (day 9) so in that aspect, it’s an improvement.

Day 19: Berry Achoo – Gotta admit, I was dreading this after Strawberry Achoo (Day 6). This wasn’t as bad, but the notes were overall very similar and it was not a favourite.

Day 20: Ice Cream Earl Grey – The tea definitely smelled like ice cream, but in terms of taste it was mostly Earl Grey. The bergamot notes weren’t too strong, which was a good thing for me.

Day 21: Christmas Spice – I brought this for a tea-packing party and it was A Hit. Everyone thought it was the perfect embodiment of the Christmas season and really enjoyed the fruity and cinnamon notes.

Day 22: Winter Cranberry – Another tea that was shared and was a hit (perhaps it’s just me who’s on the critical side). This one had more orange than cranberry notes, but it had a good balance between tart and sweet.

Day 23: Caramel Rooibos – This smelled like caramel and vanilla. It was sweet without being cloying, but sadly, still not rooibos note. It reminded me of Pancake Stack (Day 14) for some reason.

Day 24: Gingerbread – Perhaps because it’s the last day, but this didn’t really live up to expectations. It was a nice spiced tea, but I didn’t really get the gingerbread notes. Plus, I’ve already had quite a few Christmas-spiced teas in the calendar so this tasted pretty similar to them.

Overall thoughts

I definitely had fun trying these teas. Not all the flavours were to my taste, but I enjoyed a good many of them and expanded my tea tastebuds (a little).

Would I buy any of these teas? Probably not. They were fun, but they weren’t blends that I felt like I wanted to drink year-round.

What about the hot chocolates? There were a few of those that I would be interested in getting! Hopefully they’re in supermarkets in the UK and I can get one or two when I next go (probably 2021).

Would I get this advent calendar again? Again, probably not. It’s a pretty good calendar – I really appreciated the fact that it’s loose leaf, but there are so many other brands out there who have advent calendars that I’d like to try. And while the sachet nature of the calendar was very handy (especially for bringing teas and hot chocolates around), I do miss opening a door every day. I understand that it constraints the amount of tea and maybe even the format you can have, but it’s a tradeoff that I’m willing to make, I think.

Thanks to work, the Christmas season has been rather subdued this year – I was in the car this morning, trying to decide if it was too early to play Christmas music when I realised that IT WAS CHRISTMAS EVE – so these Advent Calendars were a pretty good way to bring the Christmas spirit into December, if only for a few moments each day. I’m pretty sure that the few Christmas-related posts/books I read were due to these calendars reminding me that we were in advent.

I got this on Kickstarter, but I just checked out the Yawn Brew website and found that they’re having a sale on the Advent Calendars. So if you want to experience Christmas in the New Year, you could consider getting one now.