A Matter of Taste

Spiced Tea Toddy Style, an aromatic black tea blend (infused with lemon, cardamom, cloves and cinnamon) is a hot seller at the plush Brooke Bond Taj Mahal Tea House in Mumbai. A more careful glance at the menu card says the toddy influenced tea blend is created by the Hindustan Unilever Chairman and MD, Sanjiv Mehta. The CEO blend (thats how it is referred to), along with the sumptuous three-tier snack platter, could be a good accompaniment for a leisurely Sunday evening chit-chat session with friends.

At his sprawling office at the HUL headquarters in suburban Mumbai, Mehta personally asks you for your preference of tea and guides you to his tea chest, which holds unique blends from across the world. The tea collection may get a little confusing but he at once makes it easy for you by offering to brew for you his favourite blend. He carefully blends a Kenyan variant of Lipton Yellow Label with homegrown Taj Mahal tea. "This is my favourite and I have this every morning," he says.

So, did Mehta ever consider to become a professional tea-taster? "Not really, I used to even do a lot of wine-tasting at one point, but tea is what stayed on."