Trying tea from Under the Whispering Door

My friend and I decided to try some of the teas mentioned in Under the Whispering Door for ourselves. For this experience, we went through the book and picked 4 of the teas that were given to people in Charon’s Crossing and Treats. The 4 teas mentioned explicitly were peppermint tea, kuding cha Tea, gingerbread tea, and orange tea.

A visit to Charon’s Crossing Tea and Treats.

Peppermint Tea is what the main character, Wallace, receives when he first goes to Charon’s Crossing Tea and Treats. He describes a strong smell of peppermint and is told he is drinking an organic loose-leaf tea. For our peppermint tea, we tried Happy Belly Herbal Peppermint Tea.

Our initial thoughts were that it did indeed have a strong peppermint smell, but it also smelled very herbal. I rated it a 2/5 on smell, as I couldn’t get over the strong herbal scent, and my friend gave it a 3/5 for similar reasons. Thankfully, the peppermint tea tastes better than it smells. My friend and I both gave it a 4/5 on taste, with mostly notes of peppermint. You can't taste the herbal components as much as you can smell them. My friend has continued to drink the tea and says it helps settle the stomach and is a relaxing drink at night.

For our next tea, we tried kuding cha tea which we bought from a local Asian grocery store. kuding cha tea is mentioned in the book when a new person comes into the tea shop. The owner of the Tea shop Hugo explains to Wallace

“It’s a Chinese infusion. The literal translation is bitter nail tea. It’s usually made from a type of wax tree and holly. The taste isn’t for everyone. It’s very bitter, though it’s said to be medicinal. It’s supposed to help clear the eyes and head. Resolves toxins”

After hearing how it was bitter we were both a bit apprehensive to try it out. I tried it first and thought it both smelled and tasted terrible. It tasted very overpowering and stung your mouth, and the smell was very acidic. I gave it a 1/5 on both smell and taste. My friend, who is a bit more of a tea connoisseur, gave it a 2/5 on smell and taste. They said it reminded them of black licorice, and stated the initial taste was okay but the aftertaste was too much. 

For our next drink, we tried gingerbread tea. The quote from the book is “Her tea tasted like gingerbread. She said it was because her mother made the most beautiful gingerbread houses and castles. Gumdrop doors and cookie towers. Moats made of blue icing.”

With a description like that, we were ready to jump into this tea. We tried Twining’s Gingerbread Joy Black Tea. This tea was my friend’s favorite. They said it smelled and tasted wonderful, though the black tea taste was a bit strong. They gave it a 4/5 on both smell and taste. I, not a tea fan and questioning why I wanted to do this blog, gave it a 2/5 on both smell and taste as I felt it tasted only like black tea and smelled like it too. I definitely wanted more Christmas vibes from it, but it's probably a taste profile thing and it's possible gingerbread herbal tea would have been a better experience.

Finally, a customer comes in near the end of the book and gets served an orange tea. This tea was my favorite and we used the Bigelow Orange and Spice Herbal Tea for our tasting. I thought this one smelled the best; it smelled like spices with a hint of orange. We both gave it a 4/5 on smell. For the taste, I would say it tasted like orange-infused water. The orange flavor was not overpowering, but more subtle, and you got hints of the spices. Wallace describes it perfectly when saying “… Breathing in the orange mingled with spice. He could almost picture it, lying on the ground in the grass, looking up at a tree heavy with fruit, the leaves swaying softly in a cool breeze, sunlight trickling through the branches. He drank deeply, the tea sliding down his throat, warming him from the inside out.” My friend and I both gave this tea a 4/5 on taste.

At the end of our tea party, we had a short discussion of what tea we thought would be served to us at Charon’s Crossing Tea and Treats. I said that I would hope for something fruity, like strawberry green tea, which is my current favorite tea drink. The warm fruity taste reminds me of summer and feeling warm in the sun's rays. My friend picked masala chai tea and said it reminded them of getting a warm hug.

Overall, this was a super fun time, and we both really enjoyed trying a few of the teas served in Charon’s Crossing Tea and Treats from Under the Whispering Door.