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Assam Tea

Assam teas are a robust black tea indiginous to India. Classic Assams offer an exquisite and robust drinking experience often with notes of malty or honey-like sweetness. Because of their robust flavor, they are often combined with other teas to make breakfast blends like Irish Breakfast. Their strength also allows them to stand up well to the addition of milk, but many still prefer Assams straight.

Broken-leaf varieties can steep quite quickly and should be infused for a short time, while whole-leaf varieties can steep a bit longer.

Assam teas come from a sub variety of the camellia sinesis and fill a unique place in the history of tea. In the early 1800's, the British thirst for tea was not being adiquately met by Chinese production, so the British looked to cultivate tea for their own consumption in India, then a British colony. Attempts to import Chinese tea plants to India did not go well at first, but then it was discovered that India already had an indiginous variety of tea plant, the Assam variety, that had never been cultivated for drinking purposes. Thus, Assam spring from a truly western tea tradition which is quite distinct from Chinese tea traditions that permiate most other varieties of tea.