Review of Dilmah Lover’s Leap Single Estate Ceylon Tea
In case you’re not familiar with Dilmah Tea, it’s a company founded by Sri Lanka native Merrill J. Fernando. It produces only teas made from Ceylon tea. All the tea they produce is grown, picked, and packaged by the people of Sri Lanka, thus keeping the money made from the tea with the people of Sri Lanka.
Lover’s Leap is part of Dilmah’s Watte Single Estate series. Grown at an altitude of 5,700 feet above sea level, it’s the highest grown of the four tea’s in the line. The altitude at which a tea plant is grown has a profound effect on the quality of the tea. In the case of Lover’s Leap, the high plantation has produced a tea with liquor more delicate in color, nose, and flavor than you would normally associate with a Ceylon tea.
The color of the liquor is yellow-brown with green reflections. It’s bright and so clear that if you drank the tea from a glass cup, you could almost read through it. The fragrance is somewhat woodsy with an underlying fruity note. The mouth feel is just pleasantly astringent. The flavor is similar to the fruitiness of a Darjeeling, but with a richer, more tannin taste. It’s rather reminiscent of the oak-like wines of Mendocino County in California. The tea has a crisp, snappy flavor that lingers in the mouth a few moments after swallowing.
Lover’s Leap comes in a cylindrical tin with a tight-fitting cap that seals in the flavor without being hard to open. The container holds 20 pyramid-shaped nylon bags. The label says that the leaves are Pekoe 1 grade, which means they are larger pieces than found in most teabags.
You can buy Dilmah Tea quite readily online at many purveyors. While it is available at brick and mortar stores, the prices are often extremely high because it is a specialty tea. Online usually offers better deals.
brewed on Jan 26th, 2010
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