The world of Japanese tea is wide and deep. By now many people know Matcha, Gyokuro, Sencha. Some other teas may not have been in the spotlight but they are also worth some attention. One of them is Kukicha, or stem tea, if translated literary form Japanese. What that means is that Kukicha mostly includes […]
Spring is when some of the most prized Japanese teas are made. Called ‘jade dew’, Gyokuro is one of the highest-grade teas of this season. Rich an umami unlike any other tea, Gyokuro is appreciated in Japan and around the world. But how did it come to be and how is it produced? The story […]
March is the month when winter sets off and tea plants are pruned to be prepared for the incoming spring. The big leaves that came all this way through winter, are the very last leaves of the year. Because very coarse, in some regions are just cut off and used as fertiliser. Nevertheless, in some places […]
In 1874, Japanese authorities invited two Chinese tea experts to teach black tea processing techniques to Japanese farmers. The produced teas were considered a bit of a failure and it was decided that more detailed knowledge was necessary to produce a black tea that would convince the export market. So in 1875, the government sends […]
It comes as no surprise to many that when you leaf through books on Japanese tea, you more often than not encounter only mention of green teas: sencha, matcha, bancha, gyokuro, etc. We mostly associate Japan with green teas. What is not such common knowledge, is that Japan actually has quite a chunk of black […]
We would like to introduce you to a type of Japanese tea that is so rare that nowadays only 7 farmers produce it: Goishicha. A fermented tea from the area of Otoyo, Kochi, on the beautiful island of Shikoku, Goishicha meets its origins all the way back to the Edo era at the beginning of […]