Sagano-yu, a café in Arashiyama, Koyoto

We had tea at a café in Arashiyama area in Kyoto, called Sagano-yu. The building was originally an old public bathhouse, and it was renovated into a café. So, you will find signs of the nostalgic aspect in the building. From our seat, we could see bamboo trees in the terrace. It was a nice, cool café with white-themed interior, and I loved them. We had a gyokuro tea set, matcha latte, and matcha parfait.

Sagano-yu webpage (Japanese) >>> http://www.sagano-yu.com/

Koryuji in Kyoto

On the Kyoto trip, we also visited a temple, Koryuji, which is located close to the Kyoto Studio Park. At the temple, brilliant green of trees was impressive. They have a very famous Maitraya statue, which is first designated as a national treasure of Japan. It was displayed in a hall with a comfortable dim illumination and nice air condition. The hall was almost like a museum. Some other Buddha statues were also displayed in the hall, and some people were calmly walking around and appreciating the statues. There was a space with tatami mats in front of the Maitraya. Some people sat and were meditating there. We did the same as well. Koryuji had a calm and peaceful time with Japanese national treasures and important cultural properties.


Picture of the Maitraya statue (Wikkipedia) >>> http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%82%A4%E3%83%AB:Maitreya_Koryuji.JPG

Kyoto Studio Park

We went to Kyoto on this spring vacation. It is about three hour drive from here. We visited Kyoto Studio Park, where actual period movies and TV dramas being filmed. Their outdoor set looks just like the Edo town. You will almost confuse being in a real ancient town. We joined a short tour for the outdoor sets, and enjoyed some events held in the park.

Kyoto Studio Park webpage >>> http://www.toei-eigamura.com/?c=2

Playing with a sword at a gift shop

The park was crowded

Back-alley in the town

Tea set for gyokuro

This is a tea set specialized for gyokuro, which Hiro’s grandfather used to use. The teapot is hohin type. It is a small teapot with no handle. A tea strainer is mounted on this teapot. The teapot holds about 100ml (3.5oz), and teacups hold about 20ml (0.7oz)/each. They are very small, aren’t they? Look at the picture on the right. This hohin teapot is only as big as a regular tea cup. This tea set includes a water cooler, which you just pour hot water into it, and cool the water. You don’t have to have this kind of specialize tea set. You can prepare gyokuro with a small kyusu (side or back handle teapot) and cups, but smaller will be better for gyokuro as you see here.

We have a spring holidays week in Japan! So, I’ll have a little break from this blog. See you in a week!

Gyokuro, Japanese premium green tea

Gyokuro is prepared with lower temperature and much smaller portion of water than sencha (the most common green tea) preparing. The magnificent allure of gyokuro is the abundant umami. The umami flavor is appreciated as the distinctive quality of Japanese tea, which doesn’t find much in English or oolong tea. English and oolong tea which prefer for their great aroma are prepared with boiling water to bring the aroma out. On the other hand, about 50 degree C water is used to infuse gyokuro for the best umami.
Gyokuro is produced with similar processes as sencha’s. The different process is a cover culture. The tea plants for gyokuro are covered to avoid direct sunshine for about twenty days after new shoots of leaves sprout. Young tea leaves naturally have a lot of umami (or Theanine, amino acids). Theanine change into bitterness (catechin) by the sunlight. Therefore, the covering makes tea leaves that a lot of umami remains in.


The picture is Uji-gyokuro from kyoto (50g 1050yen) that I bought at a Big tea store, Mikuniya-zengoro. Gyokuro look like Sencha tea leaves, don’t they?

Hiro wore kimono at the tea lesson

The generation of my grandparents used to wear kimono. Typical young people in Japan don’t ware it. There are not so many occasions to wear it nowadays. The young generations may or may not have one set of kimono, and they probably don’t know how to put it on by themselves. Hiro is one of them, but now we are taking The Way of Tea (or sado) lesson. Formally, you have to wear kimono at the tea ceremony. This is a good opportunity to learn about kimono. Putting kimono on for men is not so difficult, but you’ll need some practice for women’s kimono.

I have a set of kimono, but not for tea ceremony. So, I didn’t wear it this time. Hiro didn’t also have kimono for tea ceremony. For yesterday’s lesson, my mother lent Hiro her kimono, and helped Hiro to put it on. Hiro will learn how to wear it, and need practice for a while.
Kimono made Hiro change. The way she walk and her attitude looked better with kimono. I guess, maybe because kimono is pretty tight, so you cannot stride, and Hiro had to do things in style. Anyway, we loved kimono and enjoyed the lesson with it.

Hojicha latte at Starbucks

About a couple month ago, I saw a signboard of hojicha latte when I walked by a Starbucks. Hojicha is Japanese roasted tea. You can find matcha latte at many places in Japan, but I’ve never seen hojicha latte before. Since then I’ve been curious about the mysterious drink. And we finally had a chance to try it this weekend.



The hojicha latte had foam on the top, and I could see a teabag in it. When I brought the cup to my mouth, I smelled a nice hojicha aroma. The taste was pretty lighter than café latte, and more like English tea with milk. But it was definitely new, which I’ve never tasted. The latte was slightly pre-sweated, and not too milky, and didn’t have much bitterness as cafe latte. I liked the hojicha latte. This will be my new alternative on Starbucks menu. After I drank all the latte, I noticed that the teabag was big, bigger than I expected. (In this picture, it doesn’t look big by a wide-angle lens of my camera, sorry) I want to know the recipe, and try it home.

Akafuku café

When we went to the flower exhibition, we had tea at Akafuku café in Matsuzakaya department store. Akafuku is a popular sweets maker originally from Mie prefecture. They are popular for their Akafuku-mochi, which is a confection, a rice cake covered with sweet been paste. At the café, the menu was simple. It was just Akafuku-mochi, matcha, and shaved ice. They all come with hoji-cha. We both love Akafuku-mochi. What we had were a set of matcha and 2 pcs Akafukuu-mochi at 440yen, and another set of hojicha and 3 pcs Akafuku-mochi at 280 yen. We thought they were very reasonable. There was even a more reasonable set for hojicha and 2 pcs Akafuku-mochi at 190 yen. Nowadays, a cup of cafe latte costs around 370yen. We were very much satisfied with Akafuku-mochi and the price. The cafe is very good for a quick and casual tea break. We loved the café, and definitely want to come back every time when we come to Nagoya!

Akafuku website >> http://www.akafuku.co.jp/english/akafukumochi.html

Japan Ikebana (or flower arrangement) Exhibition 2010

This Sunday we went to an ikebana (or Japanese flower arrangement) exhibition in Nagoya, which we got two tickets from our tea master. 180 of arrangement were displayed there. What most impressed me was that each arrangement was so creative and unique. Ikebana sound traditional to me, so I had thought it would have been more conservative. But, it actually was pretty liberal. There were various sizes of arrangement from regular ones to huge ones, which was bigger than a person. Not only traditional Japanese flowers were used, but also variety materials were used in the arrangements, such as wood trunks and barks, western flowers, bamboos, or gravel stones. There were also arrangements that embraced the water or an interesting vase effectively. What I can say to all arrangements was that people who did the arrangements know how to keep the flowers flesh. Every arrangement was very green and full of life. Ikebana we saw was very different from the arrangement of tea flower, but it was quite appealing!

Sweets of the day, Mar 17 – Apr 14

Here are sweets that we had in the recent lessons.

Mar 17










Mar 25
Do you see a motif of flower petal on the sweets? I think it makes the confection all the more charming.







Apr 7
I liked the cheerful color that gave me a sense of upcoming spring.








Apr 14
This confectionery is called Setomonogatari from a local confectionery shop, Sannoya. We love the taste of sweets from Sannoya. The last time we had Setomonogatari, we all loved it. This is the second time to have it.

Sixteen Tea, a blended tea from Asahi

I got a free bottle of blended tea as a prize of a lottery at a convenience store yesterday. Not major, but blended teas are popular in Japan. I don’t personally drink them much. Sokenbi-cha from Coca-Cola Japan and Sixteen Tea (Juroku-cha) from Asahi are popular brands.
The one I got was the Sixteen Tea. This tea is brewed from sixteen different ingredients, such as some barley, soy, corn, eriobotryae folium, konbu-seaweed, sesame, bamboo grass and so on. I think it appeals to health-conscious people. It has an unique aroma. The taste is more like barley tea rather than sencha. It’s smooth and doesn’t have any weird taste, but I just prefer green tea flavor. It had a very nice, cozy aftertaste (^_^)

Well boiled water makes delicious green tea

The other day I did a test for the relation between boiling times and the chlorine smell in tap water. I found that as you boil the water longer, the chlorine smell gets weaker. But I didn’t actually brew green tea with those waters in the test. Now, I’m curious how those waters affect the taste of green tea. Today I actually brewed sencha.

*Conditions*
Sencha: 2g
Water: 95ml, 75 degrees C
Brewing time: 90 seconds

I prepared two different waters. I brought the waters to a full boil, and boiled away for 5 seconds for one, and for 2 minutes for the other one. Then I cooled down the both waters to 75 degrees C for correct brewing temperature.


The sencha with 2 minutes boiled water was very natural, smooth, and refreshing. The sencha with 5 second boiled water had almost the same kind of bitterness and umami, but it also had an additional flavor. I can not describe the extra flavor well, but it is different from the bitterness and umami. It was something loud and unwelcome. I believe the extra flavor is the chlorine flavor that I found in the tap water. I would not notice the chlorine flavor in the tea if I tested only the sencha with 5 second boiled water itself. But when I compare with the other tea, the extra flavor was definitely there.
If you would like to enjoy a pure, natural green tea flavor with tap water, boil the water well before brew the tea!