"Nigel" > wrote in message
...
Some good sense there, Dominic.

My retail company Nothing But Tea Ltd based in the UK sells around the
world (34 countries to date) and our second biggest market is the USA
from which I have noticed over the past five years increasing clamour
for teas that are "earliest", "youngest", "first", "this season's".
Many of the teas we sell are better for some aging - our hand made
Georgian teas are an example, where given the choice of a range of age
from our stock, I prefer drinking ones at least two years old - but
impossible to sell a 2005 season Georgian into the US, already we are
being asked for 2008 season samples - unobtainable until June.

Nigel at Teacraft


This also brings up another point for me... I've seen some places selling
older (meaning last years or year before last's) red teas, and so I am torn
between what I thought was "conventional wisdom" of the fresher the tea the
better, or this "aging" issue. I know the oolongs are aged, the puerh is
aged, I guess some of the reds are too. I don't think anyone could age a
green sucessfully though, but who knows, I could be proved wrong some time.
I do wonder what an aged Yinzhen would taste like, were one to be able to
keep it unfaded...sort of an older honey taste I imagine.

Also there are those countries that may have no dormant period...Kenyan or
African teas? Nigel, do some of the African tea bushes produce all year
around?

Melinda