Mondays are supposed to be blue. Specially Monday mornings are supposed to be a deep, dark gloomy shade of blue. Not so for our mixologists on tour though. For them it was a hundred different shades of gold with the only blue about them being the stunning sunny sky up above and the far misty hills beyond the endless carpets of tea.
As the tender buds gleamed gold and the tea plants shone a gilded green, as if they knew they produced some of the most prized tea in the world, the team on tour arrived at the Pedro Estate – one of the best tea gardens in Sri Lanka.
Earlier in the morning Rusty Cerven from UK had created an interesting cocktail using tea from this region. At the estate the team tasted tea from the Lover’s Leap Estate, one of the most refined teas produced at this elevation.
Pedro Estate lies on the Western slopes of the Nuwara Eliya tea region. Lying at an elevation of 6,000 feet it belongs to what Dilmah termed as Ran Watte meaning the garden of gold, because the the from this region yields a golden cup. Ran Watte tea is delicate and mellow, reflecting a subtle fragrance.
The team returned to their base at the Grand Hotel, Nuwara Eliya in the evening to talk shop, stir up some tea and mix and muddle all sorts of liquids late in to the night.
