Vahdam Tea Advent Calendar: Day 13 - Darjeeling Premium First Flush Black Tea

 This is not what I expected it to be.

Let me explain.  I knew academically that Darjeeling varies greatly from one flush to another, but I had no idea a First flush would be SO different from the second and third flush Darjeeling that I'm more familiar with.

The aroma is slightly dusty, but since I couldn't think what a Darjeeling is "supposed" to smell like, that didn't give me my first clue that I was in for a new experience.  My first clue was when I poured the leaf into my measuring spoon.  Look at it!  Even the leaf looks different than what I'm used to.  Some of those rolled leaves look GREEN.  Since when is there any green in a Darjeeling?  Darjeeling looks like a black oolong!  Doesn't it??

..... Apparently not.  After a full 5 minute steep, this golden tea liquor was the darkest this first flush Darjeeling ever got.  Color me confused!

I suppose I should pause here to talk about what a flush is.  Tea plants go dormant and then grow the leaves to be harvested before going dormant again.  Depending on where the plants are growing, the dormancy period can be longer or shorter.  In the Darjeeling region, the time when the plant is growing leaves allows for three different times when the plant has grown enough new leaves to warrant a harvest.  Each of these harvest cycles is referred to as a "flush".  Hence, the first flush is the first early spring harvest of the leaves - the first time the plant can be harvested after the winter dormancy.

I am far more familiar with the tea made from the 2nd and 3rd flushes.... actually, I'm not sure if I've ever had any first flush Darjeeling before today.  I did NOT realize that it would be so drastically different from the Darjeeling that I'm used to.  I think of Darjeeling as a black tea (because that's what it is), but the first sip of this first flush Darjeeling reminded me not of black tea, nor the oolong that the color suggested, but almost more of a green tea!

My palate adjusted a bit for the second and third sips and I started to think of this not as a green tea, but as some strange hybrid of a green and oolong but with the tannic aftertaste of a black.  I had no idea what to do to it - but I knew that I was not going to enjoy it straight off the steep.  It was too.... vegetal? I was searching for a word and then I remembered the word I had learned when researching the Darjeeling from last year's calendar - muscatel!  Specifically, the part of the mascatel definition that spoke of the "hay like finish".  The hay flavor is just SO DOMINANT for me in this tea.  First flush is supposedly considered "the champagne of teas".... but it doesn't taste luxurious to me.

I've been drinking this all day now, trying to process my thoughts on the flavor.  The write up from the Vahdam website describes the flavor as:

"Delicate and light, with a clean and crisp palate and a gently sweet mouthfeel, redolent with tints of orchids and lilies, and smooth finish of lingering hyacinths"

That write up sounds.... pleasant.  That write up is not how I taste this tea.  I get...a top note of dried flowers, a dry mouthfeel with a dominant mid note of red apple peel that almost bitter and fades into a dusty hay finish with a lingering aftertaste that ... well, the best way I can describe is is that it tastes the way an itch feels.  I know that sounds odd, but at first I honestly thought that my tongue was breaking out because it tasted the same as when I have bumps in my mouth from an allergic reaction.  There were no bumps, there was no allergic reaction.... but it tasted the same.

Adding milk muddles the midnote and end notes together to get grassy apple hay - don't do it. Don't add milk.

Adding a touch of sugar mellowed the apple peel to the point where it was nearly gone.  So that was an improvement.  Oddly though, instead of bringing out another flavor in the mid note with the touch of sugar this tea has a top note - an empty space where the mid note should be- and then, that heavy hay muscatel finish that lingers with the itch aftertaste.

As I said, I've been drinking this for hours - so, as negative as my description might read, it's not a BAD cup of tea I don't think.  It's just..... cognitive dissonance levels of .... weird.  I recognize all the markers of a quality tea in my cup.... but I don't like it.

Final thoughts:  This hurts my head.  I do not enjoy the floral hay water.