Curious Tea – Satemwa Zomba Pearls
Satemwa Zomba Pearls is the first tea from Malawi I’ve reviewed. As always, Curious Tea’s comprehensive website provides a lot of useful information about this tea. So I now know that Malawi is the second biggest producer of tea in Africa, after Kenya.
Like Kenya, most of the tea produced in Malawi is low-grade CTC stuff destined for tea bags. However, there are pockets in Malawi – like the Satemwa Tea Estate who produce this tea – focusing their efforts on growing the fancy stuff.
And Satemwa Zomba Pearls white tea is very fancy indeed. The pearls of closely-wrapped tea leaves are described as ‘cocoons’ by Curious Tea and they really do resemble some kinds of pupae-spun chrysalis. If you came across them in your woodshed, you’d wonder what on earth made them.
(Although, obviously, we know that they were made by the good people of the Satemwa Tea Estate through a laborious process of plucking, withering and rolling by hand.)
I brewed this tea at 80 degrees as directed and after the first steeping, the pearls hadn’t unfurled at all. They just sort of sat there looking pod-like. They were clearly doing some sort of business though as the first cup came out as a honey-coloured golden liquor.
It’s subtle, though, taste-wise. Even by the expected ‘subtle flavour’ standards of white tea. Curious Tea promise “a creamy mouthfeel” and I definitely got that. There’s a smooth milkiness to this tea that helps it slip down a treat. I struggled, however, to detect any of the ‘sweet fruity profile’ or ‘lightly woody’ notes that I was told to expect.
I also couldn’t detect much actual tea-ness in the first cup. It was – to use a phrase I’ve employed before when talking about herbal tea – like a cup of delicately fragranced hot water.
I kept persevering though. This tea went through six or seven steepings during the course of the day. (The teamonger recommends brewing 4+ times.) Apart from anything else, I was curious to see at what point the tea pearls would start unfurling.
I can report that after the second steeping, the magic starts to happen. The flavours begin to make themselves known and by the third steeping I had something floral and fruity and with a satisfying hit of Camelia sinensis-ness. I feel like the flavour profile started to deteriorate after the fifth steeping, but it’s possible I was just a bit fed up with it by that point. Steeps 3 to 4 seem to be the sweet spot.
“But Tea Fancier,” I hear you ask. “At what point did the tea cocoons fully unfurl and become recognisable leaves of tea?” Well, reader, the answer is they don’t. Not fully. Sure, a couple of the outer leaves came away and some stray bits separated and got lodged in the teapot spout. But for the most part, the pearls remained intact. After 12 hours, I still had two clumps of tightly wound leaves in the pot.
This isn’t what I expected to happen. I found it quite exciting. I can only conclude that this is how it’s supposed to happen – they’re not supposed to unravel.
After a lacklustre start, Satemwa Zomba Pearls turned out to be a very nice tea indeed. It just requires time and patience. Which is fair enough. This isn’t some chopped-up CTC teabag blend. Satemwa Tea Estate clearly take tea production very seriously and have delivered a tea that demands some respect.
And – after the journey we’ve been through together – I am more than happy to give the Satemwa Zomba Pearls the respect it deserves.
Today’s featured book is The Ladybird Book of The Zombie Apocalypse. And, look, I’m sorry about that. Zomba is a large city in Southern Malawi which has nothing to do with the undead and I know I said I would give this tea some respect, but reading the name of the tea and not being reminded of Zombies was just too difficult.
