Darjeeling Puttabong Summer (#2)

Oh, Adagio… changing all your musical names has really confused my delicate sensibilities when it comes to logging teas. (Also, Steepsters… I’ve been changing the names here. Hope you don’t mind.)

This is a pretty good Darjeeling. I still haven’t quite put my finger on that… Darjeeling-y taste, in order to describe it properly. But, it’s yummy just the same.

Having this a year later, new batch of course. I must it was a bit more enjoyable this time so I have bumped my rating up from 67. Goes to show how important it is to try from different harvests.

This is my second last cup of this Darjeeling before I’ve run out, and I’m going to miss it so much when it’s gone. It’s the last of my Good Darjeelings. I’ve got plenty of an Okay Darjeeling, which will have to do.

But this one. THIS ONE. Not my absolute, absolute favourite, but lovely. Light body, sweet, characteristic Darjeeling-ness and nice and woodsy-fruity. Holds up well to milk and sugar, in spite of its lightness. My favourite Darjeeling is a bit fuller than this one, but this’ll do very, very nicely.

I’ll miss you, Good Darjeeling.

Backlogging. See previous notes.

Hm. I think I enjoy Darjeelings more when I think of them as oolongs rather than black, and in light of what I’ve read about them recently, that may not even be inaccurate! (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darjeeling_tea if you too are curious). Anyway – light body, amber color, spicy/fruity/muscatel(?) scent, and a really light floral taste. I think if I’d brewed this any longer it would have been unpalatably harsh; as it is, there’s just a hint of astringency.

This is quite nice, but unless it lasts more than two steeps I wouldn’t choose to buy it over a similar tasting oolong.

Very floral in smell, taste and aftertaste. Natural and lightly sweet, but I do pick up some bitterness as the cup cools. Not a bad cup at all.

Mmmmm, Darjeeling!

This has a lighter, more delicate flavor than Darjeeling No. 22. I still like 22 better, but I wouldn’t say no if someone offered me a cup of this tea. Lightly sweet, with a faintly grassy taste. This tea is very coarse in texture, so it pays to add a larger volume when I steep.

Loved this! Slightly floral but not overpowering. Second steep was pretty good!

In cleaning out my hoard of black teas, I have been specifically focusing on reducing the number of Darjeelings I have on hand. Unfortunately, I fear that I may be starting to burn myself out on them. Either that or I have just run into a couple of Darjeelings that really have not done it for me. I have one more that I am hoping to polish off before the end of the week, so we’ll see which is the case. This one, at least, was pretty good.

I prepared this tea using the one step Western infusion I normally use for non-Chinese black teas. I suppose that I could have attempted another infusion with this tea, but to be honest, I did not feel the need. For the purposes of this review, I steeped 1 heaping teaspoon of loose tea leaves in 8 ounces of 212 F water for 5 minutes. Adagio recommends a steep time ranging from 3-5 minutes for this tea. I tried several different times in that range, but found that I preferred the 5 minute infusion time. The others yielded a tea that was a little underpowered for my tastes.

The first thing I noticed about this tea was that it was not specifically comprised of full leaves. I noted a number of broken leaves, as well as what appeared to be fannings. Obviously, this is not 100 percent high grade tea. I also noted a dusty smell with a hint of grape. After infusion, the liquor showed a delicate golden amber in the cup. Mild aromas of cream, toasted almonds, malt, honey, apricot, golden raisins, and Muscat grape were present on the nose. In the mouth, I noted a relatively smooth, soothing mixture of straw, golden raisin, apricot, honey, malt, cream, toast, toasted almond, and Muscat grape flavors. The finish was very clipped and mild, offering lingering impressions of toast, malt, honey, toasted almond, golden raisin, and Muscat grape.

To be fair, this was a lot more complex than I was expecting it to be. I really dug the aroma and flavor of golden raisin demonstrated by this Darjeeling. It was entirely unexpected, giving this tea a very unique presence that separated it from the other Darjeelings I have been drinking lately. This was also a very pleasant tea that was easy to drink. I would have preferred to see more depth and a longer, more powerful finish, but this would have required a greater proportion of higher grade leaves that would have driven the price point up. I tend to be really picky about summer Darjeelings, and to be honest, I do not normally like them nearly as much as spring and autumn flushes, but this one isn’t bad. Its fine layering of aromas and flavors is extremely commendable given the mixed quality of the leaves and the lower price point. I doubt I would purchase this tea again anytime soon, but if I were looking for a decent, respectable summer Darjeeling at an affordable price, I could see myself revisiting this one.

New to darjeeling, they seem much lighter than the blacks I am used to. So far, enjoying very much! I can drink this tea straight but I do prefer a smidge of sugar (maybe 1/4 – 1/2 teaspoon for a mug). Normally in my strong blacks (breakfast tea, golden monkey, black dragon pearl etc) I do scant teaspoon and splash of milk, but this is so light and delicate I would never add milk. Wonderful aftertaste. I did 1 steeping teaspoon per cup, steeped for a full 5 minutes and next time I am thinking of increasing the leaves to see if I can make it a little bolder while still having the light taste.