Friday, June 29, 2012

Color of tea cup


I love white color for tea cups.  You can see the natural hue of the tea.  I personally think that tea in a dark colored cup doesn’t look so delicious.  The cup’s color also has a significant impact to the impression of the taste.

The two cups of tea in the picture are the same.  However, don’t you see the obvious different impressions between them?   Can you tell why?



The cups are both made of white porcelain having the same texture but you can tell the difference between the colors.  The cup in the left is yellowish white, and one on the right is bluish white.  I’m not saying which is good or bad.  I just think that the tea in the yellowish cup seems to have a more rounded flavor with umami containing essence of genuine.  On the other hand, the tea in the bluish cup looks more refined and seems to have a clear and crisp flavor.  Again, they are the same tea, so they taste the same when you drink them.  Interesting, isn’t it?  Which one would you prefer?

You can make the taste of the tea look different by the color of cup.  It is one of the most important aspects when you choose your cups!


11 comments:

  1. Interesting article. I like to drink tea, but I never pay attention to the color of the tea cup

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    1. I wonder if only Japanese care about the color of cups (^^)

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  2. I would prefer the color of tea in the blue cup. I often drink fukamushi cha and i like vibrantly green teas better than yellowish ones. I assosiate it with freshness, sweetness, strength and the elegant bite of bitterness i love about sencha.

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    1. I love your description of fukamushicha! I have been drinking fukamushi cha since I was a child, and I’m now exploring on regular sencha. I want to know more about tea!

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  3. My family usually drinks from blue cups as it accentuates the green quality of the sencha. It's especially good during these summer months because it is also cooling to look at :)

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    1. Absolutely! I agree with you on that blue cups look good in the summer!

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  4. I've experienced this myself! Before drinking japanese tea, I favored a green and yellow mug for my black and herbal teas. But since drinking the lush green teas, I prefer white cups. I drank some sencha in the yellow mug a few days ago, and did not like the flavor of the tea at all (which is strange because the day before and the day after the same tea tasted delicious!). I think it is because the color of the tea was murky in the yellow/green mug, and perhaps my perception changed.

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    1. Your experience tells that one’s perception may not be definite. It can be affected by a variety of factors. Very interesting!

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  5. Very interesting indeed. Actually, chinese people also care about the color of the cups. It's very important because of its influence on the tea's liquor. Thanks to remind us we should always pay attention to such details.

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    1. Oh, Do Chinese people care about the color of cups?! China has more variety of tea in different colors. I guess that they are very conscious about color (^^)

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  6. I prefer my cup to be pure white so that I can enjoy looking at the true colour of the tea.

    But, if it's a choice between white with blue undertone, and white with yellow undertone, I will take blue :-)

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