In which Alys finds a way to make rooibos even more vile-tasting.

Sunday was a day of tea-tasting and experimentation, including one epic failure.

Because I cannot make myself like the smell and flavor of rooibos, so matter how hard I try, I got someone else to try Tea Forte's Apricot Amaretto rooibos tisane.   My taster, the redoubtable +Lynda Brooks, approved of it generally, although she noted a certain resemblance to the flavor of Fisherman's Friend Cough Drops.

Our key mistake was thinking that an Amaretto-flavored rooibos brew might improve with the addition of almond milk.  Amaretto is almondy, right?  From thoughts like that are great mistakes made.

If there is anything more vile than straight up rooibos, it would be rooibos with almond milk.   The almond milk did nothing to detract from the Robitussin-like smell of the brew.  On tasting, there was no almond flavor, just a cloying, repulsive, creamy and slightly nutty slime.  Even worse, adding almond milk managed to make the flavor sort of sticky and hard to get off of my tongue.   Edven Lynda, who had not objected to the Apricot Amaretto straight up, found that the addition of the milk made it nearly undrinkable.

After the squamous horror of the tisane with milk, none of us were inclined to drink any more of the tea, even without milk.  I'm really going to have to hire myself a full-time rooibos reviewer.