More great Gopaldhara Darjeeling! I won't say much about them or other background since lots of posts have done that, and mostly just describe trying two more really nice versions.
I have some spring and white tea versions that look even more novel and interesting (many thanks to Rishi for sharing samples to try), but we're in the middle of a cold snap in Bangkok (down to 20 C or so at night, finally into the 60s F here). It's too cold for lighter teas, probably about time I try out making a batch of masala chai again. This weather has been perfect for running, a subject I wrote a bit about here recently.
Gopaldhara Everest Orchid – Second Flush 2021
This amazing and rare second flush black tea from Gopaldhara Tea Estate is one of the best muscatel black tea in Darjeeling hills, made by AV2 bushes. The tea is expertly fully oxidized to extract all the flavour. It takes a lot of different processes to oxidize, without crushing and cutting the leaf.
This rare second flush black tea has brownish dry leaves with abundant golden tips that brew into a red aromatic liquor. You will find a honey-sweet and very well-rounded muscatel finish with the notes of ripe fruits, almost like red wine. This tea is very clean with absolutely no hints of astringency and harshness.
It has astringency in the sense of feel structure but not harshness, so that last part works. It's cool that I just read that description during the final post edit, after adding pictures to the notes, with their description and mine both mentioning red wine. I said that it tastes more like brandy to me, but had even mentioned that the effect could be interpreted as either red wine or brandy. It must seem like I go back and change the notes instead.
Gopaldhara Rare Muscatel Gold – Second Flush 2021
It is a tippy tea made from more than 130 years old high-quality china bushes planted by the British. It brews into a rich orange cup which gives abundant sweet muscatel character and mouthful flavor with a woody taste and notes of ripe fruits. It is a dense tea and is well layered. It is very smooth to drink and is not astringency is not apparent. It is definitely one of the best second flush produced by Gopaldhara Tea Estate from the old bushes. You will like it more if you like the old-style Muscatel tea from Chinary bushes.
That last part is a reference to how some standard tea plant types used in Darjeeling are relatively directly derived from Chinese tea plants, and some are hybrids of variety Sinensis and Assamica. I was thinking that AV2 was a hybrid, variety Sinensis mixed with Assamica genetic input, but it may not be simple whether it is or not. This research paper covers how it really is a variety Sinensis tea (a "Chinese type," as it's sometimes described), but what they mean in discussing genetic variation I'm not clear on.
I suppose it doesn't matter; information about the inputs can be interesting, about plant types, elevation, or processing steps, but the results are the thing, described as follows. AV2 plant type versions tend to have a distinctive and refined character, and that's the mapping that matters, one that can help you set expectations.
Review:
Everest Orchid Black: very nice, of course. It's typical black tea, fully oxidized, in the normal flavor and feel range, which is pleasant. Warm tones and fruit are primary. Fruit seems to include citrus but a main flavor is more like dried dark cherry, which is really nice. With the other warm tones including cocoa this is as close to a chocolate covered cherry as a tea will ever naturally be. It has astringency and feel structure related to the warm tone flavor range (earthy and including warm mineral), but it balances well.
This reminds me of seeing a Reddit post about how a Marriages Freres flavored tea is the best black tea in the world, their seemingly standard "Marco Polo" version. How could that be, based on what I've just experienced and said? This tea I've not even dialed in for infusion strength yet, and it's just getting started, but these are well-balanced, refined, very pleasant natural flavors, derived from exceptional tea plant material (related to plant genetics and growing conditions), being processed in a relatively optimum way.
I don't know what that "Marco Polo" tea is. From looking at a few references online, including the Marriages Freres web page, it's not clear what country the tea leaves are from, or what the flavoring is, seemingly just "floral and fruit." Responding to a post like that I commented that while the tea probably is good that tea experience is broad, and no matter what one experiences it's always too soon to say that you have already covered the full scope.
Rare Muscatel Gold: this tea is very subtle compared to the other; it will take longer to "get going." I used a greater volume than for the other but it probably will work out to very similar wet leaves volume after a few more rounds. This version will probably prove more durable, brewing out slower, rather than it having less flavor to offer than the other. The other tea will extract much faster for being fine leaves with less buds, and it was brewed at double the infusion strength level of this one using the same timing. I won't adjust timing by offsetting what I use for both just yet, just doing a fast round next time and seeing if that is necessary.
This is softer for being much lighter, and it lacks the warm earthy tone range the other had. There's a nice sweetness, not completely unlike the cocoa / cacao flavor in the other, but spanning that and also malt range. Honey flavor also comes across in the sweetness, and it seems like other subtle flavor tones will develop from starting points that are a bit vague so far, maybe light floral and spice. It should develop to fruit as well, which I'm not really noticing yet. It's as well to describe that more after another round instead.
Everest Orchid Black second infusion: even more floral, with more flavor depth, but astringency did ramp up too. I brewed this fast, the way that you moderate astringency using this brewing approach, but it could've been all but a flash brew instead and flavor intensity would seemingly still be fine. It did brew for 10 seconds or less, more or less a standard approach for sheng or oolong versions, kind of fast for black teas prepared this way, but adjusting timing for results instead of type is standard.
The feel is cool, rich and syrupy. There's a bit of dryness too but not so much that it's all that negative. That "warm mineral" flavor is so intense and distinct that it's in between ink and brandy. There's a lot going on in this tea, with the earlier fruit and cacao still present, but floral range (rich like rose) and warm tones ramping up. The brandy part one might interpret as closer to a red wine, but to me it's definitely closer to brandy. I suppose the astringency and touch of sour / bitter effect that results from feel mapping over to flavor range is somewhat negative, just really moderate, and not entirely negative, since it provides a base for the rest. That is exactly the feel aspect that people identify as bitterness, when really it's not that, it just comes across in a similar way. Here it's more an addition of feel structure than a pronounced roughness though, lighter and in good balance. It's quite good.
Rare Muscatel Gold: it's interesting trying these together for there being no related astringency at all in this version, at the opposite extreme. It probably makes the first seem a little rougher and this version seem even smoother, or maybe even thin, in one sense. After hundreds of comparison tastings it's no problem tasting dissimilar tea versions, and I can separate the effects just fine. Fruit does ramp up in this, as expected. Intensity does too, but it's subtle. The feel for this is rich and creamy, intense in a very mild and distinct form.
Back to flavor, citrus picks up as dried orange peel. There's a mild but sweet and rich tone that one might connect with butter or caramel. I still get a sense that mild and non-distinct floral range is filling in complexity, that something along the line of chrysanthemum is giving this the effect of greater intensity and depth, even though it's hard to isolate. It's not that far off a mild root spice range, in between sassafras and ginseng, so pegging it as that instead would make sense.
It probably will make sense to stick with a fast infusion for the first tea and go a bit longer for this one; I'll try that next round. Longer here only means 15-20 seconds, which is an extended time for this high proportion. Judging from still partly wetted leaves there is slightly more material in the first sample; guessing out completely different forms of leaves should result in that more than it typically does. The first sample will be 90% full or so unfurled and this only 80-some.
Everest third infusion: it's interesting how that warm mineral tone, astringency, dryness, and complex flavor range all balance together. For someone into conventional black teas this would be just perfect, better than anything remotely standard, never mind comparisons to flavored teas. For a mild Chinese black tea drinker it might be a bit much, that edge. I can easily appreciate it for what it is, but I suppose the milder and varied flavor set in typical Dian Hong (Yunnan) is still a better match to my preference, teas that can be fruity but often build on a cool roasted yam or sweet potato base, with dried fruit or cocoa flavors complementing and layering on top of that. For the style this tea is it's just perfect; it's important to give credit where credit is due. If warm tones and astringency could back off just a little it might be slightly better, to me, but it's already as high quality, complex, refined, and balanced an example as it can be, so that's more a comment about style than quality level.
Muscatel Gold: more of the same. I don't want to overstate how slight shifts in balance come across in this; the flavors I mentioned will change in proportion over rounds, and eventually one or two more will join that set. This does live up to the name "muscatel" but it's a mild version of it, closer to citrus fruit than the rest of what muscatel tends to mean (towards grape or grape based liquor).
Conclusions:
I left off taking notes there, for whatever reason, but I did drink a number of additional positive infusions. It can be hard to do hour long tasting sessions on busy weekend mornings and for teas that tend to evolve and transition less (black teas or even oolongs in comparison with sheng, mostly) three rounds is enough to describe where it's going.
The subject of trying two very dissimilar sheng versions reminded me of how it might be interesting to mix these two teas, to try them as a blend. I don't remember if I actually did or not, but I think so. I really prefer experiencing narrower range of aspects, not appreciating the trade-off of greater balance of character that comes at the cost of muddling together a range of distinctive aspects. For teas with more in the way of flaws that's something else; it would help a lot to mix inputs to work around problematic astringency or unbalanced flavors, or thinness across some range, like a lack of sweetness. In one sense mixing these two teas would pull both towards more of a middle range for style, mixing the light body of one and higher level of feel structure of the other, for example, but the distinctiveness would be lost.
Cindy, of Wuyi Origin, a Wuyishan oolong and black tea producer, sent some Jin Jun Mei to try, the style of which overlaps a little with this Muscatel Gold version. Only so much; I'm not saying this tasted or seemed like JJM. That light body, touch of creaminess versus structure, and subtle flavor range are what I mean. I don't know how well I can hold an impression of this tea in memory for weeks but I can say more about parallels whenever I try that.
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perfect weather for riding bikes at a local replica park, in Ancient Siam |
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I did eventually tighten up her bike helmet strap for her |
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