Tea and Wine: Educating the palate

When was the last time you bought wine which said 'French Table Wine, and poured out of a box? And how much did you pay for it? Why do connoisseurs pay more for a Chateau Neuf du Pape or a Merlot and insist on a particular year over the others?

On the other hand why do the same people feel content buying tea out of a box, which says Indian or Ceylon tea?

Tea, like wine, has qualities that depend on its geographical location. So just as a red wine from Chile will taste differently from a red wine from France, orthodox teas from India will be very different from orthodox teas from Ceylon or Kenya. Wines in France, too, will have regional differences with a Cotes du Rhone having a taste and bouquet unlike that of a Burgundy or Loire grape.

Similarly, among the teas in India, Terai teas will taste differently from Darjeeling, Assam or Nilgiris. Then, of course there is the difference between vineyards within the region as it is with tea estates, which depend not only on the geographical location, but also on how the property is run and its quality controls.

And then there are the different qualities of wine of each vineyard as there are different grades of tea of each estate. All of this may be bewildering at first. But once you master it, becoming a connoisseur of tea can be as much fun, as fascinating, if not healthier than being a wine connoisseur.

Unlike wines, though, tea does not do well with age. Normally, the so-called 'estate-fresh' specialty teas that you buy in the supermarket gets there after passing through the hands of a number of middle-men, often sitting in warehouses of dusty ports for months before it reaches your cup.

Try a cup of Nuxalbari Tea India. Smell and taste the difference of drinking a cup of tea, which has reached you directly within days of being plucked.

Most tea estates limit their expertise to the manufacture of one type of specialty tea. Nuxalbari Tea Estate India is probably one of the very few gardens that is proud to make all three different types of specialty Indian teas with equal finesse.