So, this is a bit embarrassing but turns out I have more teas to review! I thought I had finished most of the new-to-me Japanese teas and could start on my Karel Capek order, but I had completely forgotten about these teas from Satemwa! A while back, I got in contact with them to see if I could use their teas for wedding tea bars in Singapore. Unfortunately, all weddings will be on a small scale for the time being and I won’t be able to meet their MOQ for a while. But, I still have the samples that I bought from them to share with prospective customers and I thought it would be nice to review them as well.

The first sample is labelled Malawi Green Oolong.

First Impressions

Although the tea has ‘green’ in its name, it’s not that green. I can see a few green leaves but by and large, this looks like a fairly oxidised oolong. It has a sweet and oolong-fruity smell, which made me really excited to try it.

Tasting Notes

The first steep produced a light amber tea liquor that smelled sweet and fruity – very much like the dry tea leaves. It tastes delicious, like one of the more oxidised Taiwanese oolongs. I get a slight hint of a woody note and can’t find any bitterness of astringency. This is a very smooth tea and I’m really enjoying it.

I had two different experiences with the second steep from the two sessions I had with the tea. For one session, I lowered the temperature of the water a bit more and tried a slightly longer steep (about 1.5 minutes) and that produced a tea liquor that looked and tasted similar to the first steep but had a stronger woody note with a tinge of bitterness. For the second session, I kept the temperature fairly high and used a shorter brewing session, with the result that I had a tea liquor that was pretty much the same as the first steep – sweet and fruity. Honestly, I don’t know if this change is me overthinking what I’m drinking or if lowering the temperature slightly would bring out a bitter note.

The third steep looked lighter than the tea liquor produced from the first two steeps and it tasted lighter as well. By the next steep, the flavours were more or less gone from the tea, so that was when I ended the tea session.

Overall thoughts

I’ve always been impressed with the quality of Satemwa’s teas (I’ll link to some other teas by them below) and this is no exception. Although I initially expected something like a light-roast oolong because of the word “green”, i.e. something more green and floral, this was a sweet and fruity oolong that hit all the right notes for me. I really enjoyed it and hope to be able to get more people in Singapore to try this!

Other Satemwa teas: Malawi Zomba Pearls, Malawi White Antlers, Malawi Bvumbwe White Peony Tea.