Tea Spotlight: Award Winning Keemun Imperial Gongfu Black Tea

We are proud to announce that our Keemun Imperial Gongfu Black Tea is a winner in the 2017 Global Tea Championship!!! 

Keemun is considered one of the world’s four most famous black teas, along with Yunnan Gold Tips (“Dian Hong Jing Ya”), Lapsang Souchong (“Zheng Shan Xiao Zhong”), and Indian Darjeeling. It is frequently featured in English Breakfast black tea blends but often in very limited amounts due to its cost. 

Our Keemun in particular is special due to our commitment to sourcing true origin teas. One of the properties that makes good Keemun such a spectacular black tea is its signature floral fragrance, an attribute imparted to the tea from its unique environment where it grows at about 800 meters in the presence of many wild flowers. The unique terroir in which only the best Keemun grows is reflected in the taste, as acknowledged by the judges in the tea championship. 

Aromatically, this is a complex tea, sure to challenge even the most refined of palates with its many layers. It teases the nose with a combination of tangy red raspberries and cherry blossom. The result is a smooth and sweet black tea, not too dissimilar from a good red wine. Perhaps to no surprise, then, this special tea is often referred to as the “burgundy wine of teas!”  

The tea championships are always a source of pride for us due to the way in which the winners are determined. Rather than take entries for each class of tea and then rank them from best to worst, the judges use a threshold system. What this means is that in order to receive a 3^rd place rank, there is a set of stringent minimal qualifications that need to be met relating to the leaves, liquor, and taste. Thus, even if there were 10 submissions, it’s possible for some categories to have no award winners if the submitted teas fail to meet those minimum qualifications. This system makes winning an award no easy task, putting teas not only up against one another but up against the threshold system as well.

We’re excited that we can offer this tea to you so that you can see for yourself what makes it one of the four most famous black teas in the world!