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derk drank 2020 Winter Darjeeling White Tea by Ketlee

1637 tasting notes

Ketlee is providing all kinds of firsts in my tea journey. Here is a winter Darjeeling white tea produced probably a year and a half ago.

The dry leaf in the bag smells spicy and earthy-musky, a mix of rosewood and green chillie/leaf. I cup the leaf in my hand and it smells like fresh wheat, dried yellow peonies, and I can see where Ketlee gets vanilla wafer. The brewed aroma is a mix of cocoa and white chocolate, vanilla cream and dry grass with a bright apricot-citrus tone.

This tea is very difficult for me to describe. The flavors are round enough that it calls to mind white wine, specifically a light-oaked chardonnay but with this awesome cocoa undertone. The body, too, adds to the impression of chardonnay, thick with a gentle acidity and dryness. Along with the cocoa undertone, I think I taste white chocolate, hay, gooseberry, toast and butter along with Ketlee’s mentioned notes of lime, mango and olive. The dry aftertaste is light and lingering with something like sweet mango-cream-white chocolate-cocoa. There’s a bit of a cooling-spicy feel that also lingers with a lemon zest feel on the sides of the tongue. A second steep is sharper and the acidic fruity notes come to the fore, very lime- and pineapple-like.

I wasn’t expecting much since Darjeeling teas don’t seem to age well but wow is this something unique. I do wonder how it was fresh and also how it will age but I won’t be able to keep this around long enough to find out. What a treat!

I would like to know which estate this comes from.

Flavors: Apricot, Astringent, Butter, Citrus, Cocoa, Cream, Dry Grass, Drying, Earth, Flowers, Green Pepper, Hay, Lemon Zest, Lime, Mango, Melon, Mint, Olives, Pineapple, Rose, Round, Smooth, Spicy, Tart, Thick, Toast, Vanilla, Wheat, White Chocolate, White Wine, Wood