I drank this one a few days ago, but with work pressing in on all sides and stifling my tea drinking efforts, I haven’t had the chance to really log it until today.
So, first off, big shout out to Auggy for sharing this with me! She brought this back from a trip to the London Tea Room, so I was pretty excited to try it.
First things first – I’ve never had a Kenyan tea, but Auggy described this to me as a blend/cross between Yunnan, Darjeeling, and Assam.
The leaves here aren’t the largest, and the smell coming off of them is interestingly fruity. In a Darjeeling sort of way, but mixed with a darker tea smell. That black tea smell. Malty and earthy and full.
I steeped this one up, and boy is the cup a dark red and quite a bit murky too! The taste is… interesting. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it, days later. At peak hotness, this one really tastes like an Assam. Malty and strong and bracing. Very eye-opening stuff. There’s a tiny pipsqueak peep of Darjeeling that grows and grows as this tea cools.
By mildly hot, this one tastes like a weird mix of Yunnan and Darjeeling, with the Assam only slightly echoing in the background. The Yunnan provides this sort of earth tone, while the Darjeeling brightens things up with a fruity, grape/currant type taste.
There’s so many weird things going on here, that I’m sort of flabbergasted as to how to rate this one. It almost reminds me of SerendipiTea’s Autumnal Darjeeling in the super-crazy-magic flavor changing.
I feel like such a bore right now, but I’m so tired from work lately that I’m not really focusing and the synapses aren’t quite firing the way that they used to. Also, with the shrinking amount of sleep I’ve been getting, I’m finding that tea is more likely to upset my stomach, and I haven’t been feeling well in general.
Le sigh.
Poor teaplz =( I know what you mean, after a long day I’m just too tired to type up a tea log. And your tea log was definitely not a bore! Feel better!
Feel better!