Meghalaya Tea: India’s Young Tea Region and the Lakyrsiew Garden near Shillong

Meghalaya shares its northern border with Assam and lies just one state away from West Bengal, home of Darjeeling. Until 1972 it was part of Assam, and its capital, Shillong, was Assam’s capital too. Shillong was once branded “the Scotland of the East,” for its cool hills.

The land and terroir are close to Assam’s, but where Assam tea grows on the low, flat floor of the Brahmaputra valley, Meghalaya’s tea grows on hillsides from about 3,000 to 5,500 ft.

The name itself explains the climate. Meghalaya means “abode of clouds,” a state known for heavy rains, forest-clad hills and mist “that covers the area like a quilt.”

That rain is not guaranteed, and the tea feels it when it fails. Our spring report for 2024 recorded that Meghalaya had received only 210.1 mm of rain from March to May, against a usual 481.8 mm, a shortfall of 56%. Young leaf needs water to grow, so a dry spring means a smaller, slower crop.

Two altitudes, two kinds of tea

That altitude splits the region in two. In the lower Garo Hills, Assam-type plants grow in warm, humid valleys. Higher up, in the Khasi Hills around Shillong, Darjeeling-style plants grow in cooler air, where the leaf grows more slowly and builds more aroma. For how these plant types differ, see Chinary, Assam and clonal tea plants.

Both of the Meghalaya teas we sell come from the higher zone. Lakyrsiew lies between 1,000 and 1,300 m, and its summer and autumn teas are picked at about 4,000 ft, the autumn tea from a section of the garden set aside for it. That is why they taste closer to a Darjeeling than to the Assam teas grown a few hours’ drive away on the plains.

Over the years Lakyrsiew’s teas developed what its owners call their distinctive profile: “very mellow, with toffee and cocoa notes combined with stone fruit.” Our own estate notes also mention amaryllis and orchid.

The garden is planted with young bushes of a very fragrant clonal variety, and the leaf is wiry and well twisted, with “a scattering of ochre-hued tips.” Our tasting notes for the two current teas show how the seasons differ:

Two seasons from one garden

The summer tea follows the pattern of a second flush, fuller and fruitier than spring; the autumn tea has the woody, caramel warmth typical of the autumn flush. We have long known Lakyrsiew for its summer teas, and its fresh second flush lots join our summer range each year.

The 2022 summer lot shows the timing. It was hand-picked on 22 July 2022, graded FTGFOP1 and sold to us under invoice BD-32, and it reached our facility in Siliguri, about 514 km away, on 26 July, four days later. Our product page describes its cup as mellow, with notes of honeysuckle and peach.

The autumn tea comes much later. Its 2022 lot was picked on 9 and 10 December, at the very end of the season, when the bushes are slowing down for winter and the leaf grows rounder and less brisk. Our product data suggests it as an evening tea.

Production is tiny and each lot changes with the weather, so these are teas to taste and compare, not a uniform blend.

Meghalaya’s tea has always reached us in small, rare lots. Back in 2016 we offered Eden’s Cloud, which we described as “a rare cloud tea from the misty highlands of Meghalaya.”

The difference in the cup comes from the land. On the hot, wet plains, Assam bushes grow fast and give a thick, malty leaf; in Meghalaya’s cooler hills, the same plant grows slowly and keeps more fruit and fragrance, which is why the summer Lakyrsiew is light enough to drink without milk.

In daily life, though, Meghalaya has long drunk tea the Assam way. The writer Anjum Hasan, who grew up in Shillong, told us it has always been “a huge tea drinking culture,” but of boiled milk tea with plenty of sugar, “a Brooke Bond culture”; her parents still drink only CTC, and “the idea of brewing their tea, rather than boiling it, is quite alien to them.”

If you love a strong breakfast cup with milk, Assam is your tea. If you drink Darjeeling plain but want a little more body, a Meghalaya black is worth trying side by side with both. For the bigger picture, see Indian tea: the complete guide, and for the hill region next door, Darjeeling tea.