Goomtee Exotic Darjeeling First Flush Organic Black Tea

Another first-flush experience from Vahdam Teas. As others have noted, this one does not have a strong presence of muscatel grape to it, if any. The base of the tea is a woody, nutty body, from which there bounces some buttery, vegetal, and spice notes. The aftertaste maintains the woodiness and nuttiness, but there is substantial floral and fruity presence.

I don’t know how Darjeeling aficionados feel about the lack of the grape leaf/muscatel flavors, but frankly, I welcome it. It is nice to have an experience that is still easily identifiable as first-flush Darjeeling without being a cookie-cutter replica of the standard flavor profile.

This is the first tea I have had where the woodiness is complex, interesting, and tasty – like a good whiskey with good cask influence, or a nice oaky red wine.

A really nice, unique experience that has a great balance of savory and sweet.
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Dry leaf – grapeleaf, sassafras, licorice, dried parsley, raw nut, peanut shell. In preheated vessel – roasted nut, wildflower honey, and stewed tart red fruit (red currant, raspberry)

Smell – raw nut, peanut shell, buttery vegetal (asparagus)

Taste – hardwood, raw nut, buttered green vegetables, buttered yeast roll, hints of cinnamon butter, fresh parsley, cilantro, sassafras. Aftertaste of orange flower, gummy fruit, red currant, dried date, and fruit leather.

This is another nice tea from Vahdam Teas. It is first flush so a lot of green leaves miced in with some black leaves. It has a very light taste. I am not getting notes of Muscatel grapes in this one however but something resembling apricots. It is good in any case.

I steeped this one time in a 16oz Teavana Glass Perfect Tea Maker/Gravity Steeper with 3 tsp leaf and 190 degree water for 3 minutes.

After seeing the generally positive reviews of Vahdam teas by eastkyteaguy, I decided to order a sample pack. This was the first tea I pulled out from the pack.

I thoroughly enjoyed this one! I brewed 4 grams in 12 ounces of near boiling water for just over four minutes. The first aromas I found in the brewing process were floral and nutty. I also tasted those flavors in the liquor, along with slight malt and honey flavors. Underlying these flavors was a nice woody base. The combination of all of these works very well together! I especially appreciate the slight bitterness of the floral essence, as that is what I was hoping for with a first flush Darjeeling. The nutty aroma/flavor was very unexpected!

The leaves brew into a deep gold liquor. It is a beautiful tea to look at as well as to taste.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this tea. I hope this is a good sign for the rest of the teas I received from Vahdam. I look forward to trying my next Vahdam sample from another Darjeeling estate!

NOTE: My packet is marked with a picking date of 17 March 2017.

This was my morning sipdown a little earlier. I have been making a concerted effort to finish the Vahdam samples I recently received and get reviews for each of them posted in a timely fashion. Of the bunch, this one was strange. It was completely unlike any of the others I have recently tried.

I prepared this tea Western style. I steeped 1 teaspoon of loose tea leaves in 8 ounces of 194 F water for 5 minutes. I did not attempt any additional infusions.

Prior to infusion, the dry tea leaves gave off unexpected aromas of grass, hay, smoke, and dried flowers. After infusion, the tea took on a smokier, woodier, nuttier character with faintly grassy, vegetal undertones. I did not pick up on Muscatel at all. In the mouth, I immediately detected notes of almond, roasted peanut, smoke, grass, hay, honey, malt, and wood underscored by traces of stewed legumes, nutmeg, and dried flowers. The finish was predictably vegetal, grassy, nutty, and woody, though I could detect a slightly stronger floral presence (tea blossoms and chrysanthemum) that lingered briefly after the swallow. I again could not come up with any Muscatel presence whatsoever.

This tea was so odd. It has never been unusual for me to find nutty, grassy, and vegetal characteristics in many first and second flush Darjeelings, but what was so shocking here was not only how pronounced these presences were, but how there was no discernible Muscatel character to provide balance. This tea reminded me a lot of the Gopaldhara “Moondrop” First Flush Darjeeling from Tealyra that I reviewed fairly recently, except this tea was smokier, grassier, and more vegetal. I was torn on that tea and I am only somewhat less torn on this one. I appreciated how unique it was, but at the same time, it did not really offer what I look for in a first flush Darjeeling.