Tea Advent Calendar Day 5 – Glitter & Gold

It’s day 5 and it’s a Glitter & Gold day! Glitter and Gold is a black tea and has been a regular Christmas tea for David’s Tea for at least the past 4 years since I discovered them. It’s one of my favourites, and is known for the gold star shaped sprinkles in the tea that help to sweeten it up. This tea smells slightly spicy when opening it due to the cloves in it.

Just a little aside here, have you all guessed yet that the most exciting thing for me (besides getting to drink the teas) is that by sharing the experience with you, I also get to drag out all of the tea accoutrements that I’ve gathered over the years, and use them to try to keep things fresh every day? I have a collection of teapots, mugs and things that I love to use, and rarely a reason to get them out. Okay, back to Glitter & Gold.

I love to brew this tea in one of my clear steepers so that I can see the stars floating around as it steeps. I generally steep this tea longer, close to 5 minutes, to really bring out the flavours and give the sugar stars time to dissolve into the tea. After it’s steeped I just have to set the steeper on top of my teapot, and it releases the tea into the pot! You can’t get much simpler than that!

After steeping the smell of cloves is a little stronger than it was while still in the tin. The first sip is heavenly, a hint of sweetness and a dash of spice from the cloves, but as with Let It Snow earlier this week, the cloves are not overpowering.. Sometimes I choose to add just a dash of milk to this tea, and sometimes not. This evening it’s a “not” kind of day. It already has a bit of sugar (in the sprinkles) so unless you like your tea quite sweet, I think the sweetness level is perfect. Then again, I generally don’t take sugar or other sweeteners in any of my teas.

It’s a shame I haven’t done any baking yet, because I think this tea would be perfect with a couple of shortbread cookies. Or maybe gingerbread. Mmm, just thinking about it makes my mouth water.