tencats_tea wrote:Again I'm hopeful they will have something to get through until some of my more favored tea vendors have the new crop of Assam teas in.
Hello from a fellow Assam-devotee!
How long have you been drinking Assam? Have you noticed a drop in Quality or just normal year to year variation? I haven't been able to find my old favorite Mangalam and Meleng at the quality it was 5-10 years ago, what I now realize were probably special hand pluckings of just the best buds+leaves, that SpecialTeas used to stock. Now it's just mostly broken leaf with fewer gold tips.
I don't know if the reason is a) the climate change/droughts and labor issues that have made tea industry news, b) corporate management issues placing profits over quality, or c) bad luck on my part.
Anyway I'm always on the lookout for great Assam, and still enough of a devotee that the level of quality I can find is what I drink upon waking.
It's unique enough that nothing else scratches the itch for me, even if I can easily find objectively much "better" Darjeeling, Yunnan, and Keemun black/red teas.
Please report any good Assam finds you come across!
The one outstanding Assam I've had this past year was a pure-gold tips Dikom from Harney, I'd never seen that before. Really special tea, but more like a Dian Hong than a classic Assam.
https://www.harney.com/collections/all/ ... olden-tips
Currently sipping a blend of Mangalam, Meleng, Harmutty, Tonganagaon, and some blends from Vahdam, all about the same quality level and so I just mixed them all. And I have 500g left of supposedly SFTGFOP1 2016 Mangalam bought direct from jayshree retail for $15/500g plus $15 shipping. Drinkable (and cheap) but not the mindblowing Assam perfection I'm looking for.
I have 100g of this recently offered 2016 tippy Assam on the way, fingers crossed. Definitely my last purchase before sampling 2017 crop.
https://www.jayshreetea.com/black-tea/a ... -black-tea
kuánglóng wrote:Gongfuing some 2016 Risheehat first flush DJ1 right now.
I used to think I didn't much love FF Darjeeling, but since I found Vahdam I've very much gotten into it. Just ordered 200g of Glenburn 2017 Classic FF, samples of pricier level Gopaldhara (EDIT sp) and Glenburn FF, and 100g of Puttabong. This proves for me not to write off a category of tea, it's possible what we've sampled in the past hasn't been the best representation, and palates develop.