Greengold Georgian Tovli Esteri white tea

 

On to reviewing a Greengold Georgian white tea, their Tovli Etseri version.  It's part of a set of samples the owner, Nika, sent for review (many thanks!).  Many have been novel, pleasant, and high in quality, with some not suiting my personal preference as well as others, how that always goes.

It's this, from information in a catalog available through their website:

There are no prices on their website, since they are a producer, only selling teas at a wholesale level, not through a checkout style sales page.  Anyone really interested in the teas, who isn't a tea vendor, could still check in with them about buying them; it couldn't hurt to ask.

It's not as easy to pigeonhole Georgian tea styles as it might be in other places, with exceptions different from the norm anywhere.  Versions and styles seem to vary.

One thing I didn't do in this review is compare these to other interesting white teas that I've tried recently.  It can be hard to keep track of really fine details, and it works better to compare secondary aspects like intensity, refinement, feel, and novelty more directly, not across months of time.  I think in terms of pleasantness and those factors some others have been comparable, maybe more on par with a Chinese version than a Thai example, but that could be wrong. 

Mao Feng material Chinese white tea and Wang Put Tan Thai shou mei, reviewed here

Review:

#1:  a bit light, to be expected for this proportion being lower than normal, and quick, with the leaves needing time to saturate.  What does show through is pleasant, honey sweetness, bright melon, light floral tone, and sweet straw-like warmth.  This is what you'd hope it would taste like.  

Thickness of feel comes across already, even brewed quite light.  Not at rolled oolong intensity, but you can pick it up.

#2:  warmth and depth increases a lot.  In a limited sense intensity does, but this is still subtle, there's just a lot going on.  It's hard to break the flavor list down, given how integrated and subtle the flavors are, but in a limited sense there's a lot going on.  

Melon still stands out more than the rest to me.  Warm tones include something like the straw-like sweetness before, picking up, now towards a light wood tone, like fresh sassafras root.  It's a sappy and sweet scent that lots of lighter woods give off, when you peel a thin leather-like bark from a younger tree.  Interpretation as light and warm floral could make sense but to me it's not exactly that.

#3:  I let this soak more like 30 seconds to try it brewed a little stronger.  The earlier thick feel shifts to feel creamy now.  There's a sweetness, richness, and brightness to this that reminds me of the taste of cream.  The fruit range evolves just a little, a hint towards citrus.  It's a stretch to say that this tastes like Creamsicle, the Popsicle flavor, but it does bring that to mind.  Aftertaste range picks up a bit brewed slightly stronger, lingering more.  

This is quite pleasant.  To be clear I'm probably using positive terms to interpret flavors related to liking it.  That straw-like aspect might taste like balsa wood instead, or someone could take issue with flavors seeming subtle, the intensity.  That's just white tea for you though; if moderate intensity seems negative it's probably better to stick with other types.  Some oolongs can cover similar range and be more intense.

#4:  warmth very gradually keeps picking up.  This shifts towards a dry fallen leaf flavor range, just brighter, sweeter, and more fruity than US fall tends to cause.  It reminds me of sweeping the driveway in Bangkok, where tropical plants dropped lots of fine leaves and flowers, many from fruit trees.  The next infusion shifts slightly again, but keeping this short works since that's already the basic story.

Conclusion:

Really nice!  I tend to not care much for the most subtle range of white teas, when intensity is so limited that they don't taste like much, but this was nothing like that.  The sweetness, creaminess, melon fruit, hint of citrus, straw-like warm tones, and evolving leaf flavor range and touch of citrus were all very pleasant.  

The tea was subtle enough that pushing it a bit to bump intensity might still make sense, but I wasn't really doing that, and there was still plenty to experience.  For sure this would give just as good results using Western brewing, and it may also work out experimenting with cold brewing.