Dharamsala Mann Premium Kangra First Flush Black Tea

This may be my favorite tea so far. A great find if you are looking for an excellent lighter black tea or darker oolong without paying much of premium. At 5.49/100g, this one is a steal. I love how the light darjeeling-style fruity notes give way to a little wood and a faint “golden monkey” bottom that lingers and builds. I haven’t very much liked any of the golden monkey teas that I have tried in the past, but this tea definitely brings them to mind between sips – this time around it is not unwelcome. Love how this tea sits with you for a while and creates a nice build.

This tea is quite old now, but seeing as a won a kilo of it years back I’m impressed with both how much I’ve drank (though I gave a lot away) and how well it’s held up…

- Made a mug of it and the taste was nice but the steeping aroma is what blew me away
- Very fragrant and floral but also strongly vegetal
- Reminded me super heavily of steamed broccoli
- …or the smell of stir fried vegetables when you walk into a nice Chinese restaurant
- Taste has hints of floral sweetness
- But leans much more towards that steamed green veggie flavor

When I originally purchased this tea, it was known as Dharamsala Mann Premium Kangra First Flush, and it was excellent (see my previous reviews). Vahdam then changed their marketing on this to call it Western Himalayan Kangra — and with that change came a decrease in quality, I thought. It just wasn’t as good. I even contacted the company to see if they changed their supplier to someone else, because I was so disappointed.

Anyway, since I was so happy with the product under its former name, I had purchased a large quantity under its new name, only to find out the quality wasn’t as good. I was disappointed and left it alone on the shelf for over a year.

I recently found it on the shelf and decided to give it another try. It actually improved over that time! It had the same flavors I remember it having when I first had it under its former name! I am so happy to be able to dip back into my supply of this tea and start drinking it again. I’m no tea specialist, so maybe it is just that I prefer this tea after it has aged awhile (and maybe even gotten old and tired) — I don’t know. But I am happy to have this old friend back and look forward to enjoying it over summer.

This is a very nice tea from Vahdam Teas. It has a very light color to it and there were a lot of green leaves. There are some notes of malt and some sweet notes. The sweet notes might be described as fruity. It is good stuff. Need to try this as a cold brewed iced tea.

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.