Difference between sencha and gyokuro leaves

Hello, everyone. I learned the way to distinguish dry leaves of sencha and gyokuro at the workshop. They looked almost the same, but gyokuro leaf had slightly deeper green hue. And gyokuro and sencha leaves had similar aroma, but gyokuro had a smell that sencha does not have. In Japanese it is described as a smell like seaweed. It might not sound delicious in English, but it’s kind of propounded aroma which you cannot find in sencha.

Since I started studying Japanese tea, I've tried preparing sencha in many different conditions to find my favorite way of brewing. It is pretty fun. You will have different tea by different brewing conditions. So far, I like cold water brewing which you can bring out amazing umami (the fifth taste sensation, delicious flavor) from sencha. I’ll report you when I find my ultimate brewing.

Tea tasting

Today I’ll talk about tea tasting that I learned at the Japanese tea adviser work shop. Teas are evaluated with two aspects, appearance of dry tea leaves and substance of brewed tea.

150g of dry tea leaves are placed on a tray and evaluated the appearance. You can touch and smell them as well. Good tea leaves for sencha should be deep green, luster on the surface, rolled hard. Brewed tea tasting uses 3g tealeaves brewed with boiling water in a white porcelain cup. You evaluate water color, aroma and taste. Well balance of bitterness and umami, and refreshing aroma and after taste are good quality for sencha.

It was difficult to tell good or bad by smell of dry leaves and brewed tea color for me. Dry leaf color and brewed tea taste were easier aspects to tell the difference.

Japanese tea workshop

How are you doing everyone? This weekend I took a workshop for Japanese tea adviser. I learned tea tasting and instruction technique. It was very interesting. We did little tests of telling names of tea out of ten kinds by just watching and smelling dry tea leaves, or telling best quality sencha out of three. Other test was telling best sencha by selling and drinking brewed sencha. I hadn’t had a chance to see or taste so many different kinds and qualities of teas at once. It was valuable experience.

This is a special tea spoon for tea tasting, which was presented to every participant.

Flower of the day, chinshibai Sep 9

How are you doing everyone? There's a clear blue sky as far as the eye can see. We have autumn skis these days. You can find autumn foodstuffs in grocery stores, such as Pacific saury, sweet chestnuts, various kinds of mushrooms, and pears. I’m going to be busy enjoying them.

I haven’t introduce the flower from Sep 9 lesson. This is called chinshibai. It was used on Jun 3 lesson which had handsome-foliage I liked better.

Have a nice day!

Hojicha at Japanese restaurant

Hello, everyone. I had a chance to have Japanese cuisine including a full course meal at a fancy restaurant. The tea served there was Hojicha, roasted green tea. Hojicha has refreshing taste and goes well any kind of meal. Serving Hojicha with a nice cup and saucer was imposing to me.

Nice tea with two minute brewing with 55 degree C water (131F)

Good morning everyone! I opened a new package of regular sencha this morning. The leaves are smaller than I expected. It’s not good for regular sencha, but the taste was not so bad. I liked nice umami with two minute brewing with 55 degree C water (131F).

Tea got bitter with 20 degree C water.

Hi, everyone! I tried the three time brewing method with different temperature water, again.

I changed some conditions from before.
Amount of tea leaves: 10g >>> 6g
First brewing: 10min >>> 5min, 5 degree C >>> 20 degree C
Second brewing: The same as before
Third brewing: 1 minute >>> 5 seconds


First brewing – five minutes with cold water (20 degree C, 68F)
For The rich umami (the fifth taste sensation, delicious flavor)

Second brewing – One minute with warm water (50 degree C, 122F)
For The great harmony of umami and bitterness

Third brewing – 5 seconds with boiling water
For The bitterness

I couldn’t get satisfied result. The first tea got bitterer with warmer water, and less richness with shorter brewing time and few tea leaves. The third tea was still too strong. I want to keep trying to find out my favorite recipe.

Have a nice day!

Flower of the day, Sep 14

How is it going everyone? The mornings and evenings are now quite chilly here. This is a flower from this week lesson. I asked our master the name of flowers, but I forgot what is. Have a nice day!

Ultimate sencha brewing? II

How are you today, everyone? As I told you yesterday I tried brewing three times with different water temperature, which can bring out full quality of sencha, and you can enjoy three different teas.
Sencha: 10g (0.35oz)
Amount of water: 100ml (3.2oz)

First brewing –10 minutes with cold water (5 degree C, 41F)
For The rich umami (the fifth taste sensation, delicious flavor)
This is how much 10g tea leaves and 100ml water look like.
I used ice cubes to cool down the water.





This is the tea leaves right after adding cold water.








Waited ten minutes








Second brewing – 1minute with warm water (50 degree C, 122F)
For The great harmony of umami and bitterness
This is how tea leaves looked like after first brewing.






Waited for one minute








Third brewing – 1 minute with boiling water
For The bitterness
This is how tea leaves looked like after second brewing






From the right, first, second, third brewing teas.








**Result **
The First tea: Totally different from regular sencha, amazing umami
Color of brewed tea – Clear greenish yellow
Smell – Faint sweet aroma
Taste – Very rich umami more like gyokuro than sencha, Slight sweetness and bitterness

The second tea: Good balance in the taste
Color of brewed tea – Murky green with slight yellow
Smell – Very little aroma
Taste – Rich bitterness and umami A great harmony of various flavors and good taste-balance sencha

The third tea: Too strong with bitterness
Color of brewed tea – Murky green
Smell – full aroma of bitteness
Taste – Too bitter so I mixed it with hot water.

**Conclusion **
Overall, every tea had rich flavor. Personally, I would prefer little more milder teas. So I will use fewer tea leaves (5-7g) for the next time. The third tea was too bitter. I think one minute brewing was too long. Five seconds will be enough. The second tea was just well brewed sencha. The first tea was amazing, so you definitely should try it!!

Have a good day.

Ultimate sencha brewing?

Hi, everyone! I am studying about Japanese tea to get a qualification as an adviser. I found interesting brewing method of sencha in the textbook.

It is…

brewing three times with different water temperature.
This can bring out full quality of sencha, and you can enjoy three different teas.
Sencha leaves: 10g (0.35)
Amount of water: 100ml (3.2oz)

First brewing – Ten minutes with cold water (5 degree C, 41F)
For The rich umami (the fifth taste sensation, delicious flavor)

Second brewing – One minute with warm water (50 degree C, 122F)
For The great harmony of umami and bitterness

Third brewing – One minute with boiling water
For The bitterness

How interesting! I have to try it.
I will report you the result tomorrow. Talk to you soon!

Pottery festival in my town

How are you doing everyone? This weekend a pottery festival called setomono-matsuri was held in my town, Seto-shi in Aichi Japan. There were many stalls on the main street. They were ceramic makers, craftsmen, wholesalers and retailers, and food venders as well. You could find various kind of ceramic products. I found some nice teapots and cups for my shop. I’ll post them in the future. Please look forward to it.

Take care!

Sweet of the day, chestnuts Aug 9

Hello, everyone! The sweets from the last lesson were chestnuts look confection. Our master got them from a different sweets shop as usual. That was classic favorer simple sweets. What bothered me little was the trace of chopsticks on the chestnuts. We should have handled them better (^_^;)

Take care!