JOURNAL

€0,00 Cart Decoding Japanese Tea Types Names: What Do They Really Mean? Read it in Spanish! If you are an avid Japanese tea drinker like myself you might already know all the tea types by heart now. But do you know the reason why they are called the way they are? Possibly you might speak Japanese & already know about this, speaking the language has indeed helped me to navigate the intricate Japanese tea world. If you don’t, no worries at all, I have you covered. HOW ARE THE JAPANESE TEA TYPES NAMES WRITTEN? Almost all of them (with very few exceptions) use the kanji, character or Chinese ideogram of tea/cha… Read More »Decoding Japanese Tea Types Names: What Do They Really Mean?

€0,00 Cart Are There Any Ancient Japanese Tea Trees Left? Read it in Spanish! Even though tea has been grown in Japan for over 800 years, any of the tea trees in the country are that old. Unfortunately, the trend in the commercial Japanese tea cultivation has been to replace the tea plants every 40 to 50 years.  The majority of the existing tea trees nowadays have been propagated via cuttings, since this technique allows to preserve the DNA of the mother plant 100%. We can, however, still find some old tea trees grown out of seeds known as zairai. And some of them are a bit older than your… Read More »Are There Any Ancient Japanese Tea Trees Left?

€0,00 Cart A Look Into Japanese Teapots: Types, Styles & Usage Recommendations Read it in Spanish! If you are anything like I used to be, you might be brewing every type of tea you drink in a single teapot. Black, oolong, green, white, you name it. Everything goes, everything works. Over the years, however, I came to realize how important using the right teapot to brew tea really is. As an example, if you are using an unglazed teapot to brew every type of tea out there, you might come to realize that the taste of your brews has changed over time. But the teas you are using & the… Read More »A Look Into Japanese Teapots: Types, Styles & Usage Recommendations

€0,00 Cart Taste & smell: Do you know how do they work? Read it in Spanish! Have you ever thought about how does your taste sense work? The word goes around about Confucius once having said: “Everyone eats & drinks, but very few can appreciate the taste.” I wasn’t born yet at the time the notorious philosopher existed along with other humans so I cannot tell you for certain if this is exactly what he said. However, I can understand what this sentence means. As a tea drinker with a highly developed palate since childhood, I often thought about this. Since everyone perceives taste & odours differently it made me… Read More »Taste & Smell: Do You Know How Do They Work?

€0,00 Cart The beauty of post-fermented Japanese teas Read it in Spanish! It has been a while since I discovered Ishizuchi Kurocha,(石鎚黒茶) also known as Tengu Kurocha, a post-fermented Japanese tea. Even though the word used to describe it translates into black tea, the truth is it is a dark tea instead of a black one. But this is not the only post-fermented tea that Japan has to offer, goishicha (碁石茶) or awabancha (阿波晩茶) fall into the same category. Finally, after a lot of work & effort, I received some samples of post-fermented Japanese teas. I had a great time tasting them so I wanted to share my thoughts with you. I am… Read More »The beauty of post-fermented Japanese teas

€0,00 Cart Let’s talk about recycling & tea packaging! Read it in Spanish! While some teas come packed inside metallic cans, many still come packed in plastic or aluminium pouches covered by a layer of a material similar to plastic. And even though the tea packaging manufacturing industry is shifting to more environmentally friendly solutions, there is still a lot of work to do in this area of the tea industry.  As a consumer, you might have asked yourself many times, how can you recycle tea packaging? There should be a recycling scheme available in each country yet some of them might be better than others dealing with the residual… Read More »Let’s talk about recycling & tea packaging!

€0,00 Cart Let’s talk about bancha! Read it in Spanish! Have you ever heard about bancha (番茶) tea? Bancha is the generic name used to refer to a type of Japanese tea made using older & more mature tea leaves. But did you know that within the group of bancha teas there are a number of different types?  Depending on the region & even the farm, bancha teas might present a number of diverse characteristics. The term used to refer to this type of tea might be also different from region to region. No two bancha teas are ever the same! OK, WHAT’S THE DEFINITION OF BANCHA? The name of… Read More »Let’s talk about bancha!

€0,00 Cart Japanese White Tea from Kyoto: a review Read it in Spanish! Did you know that there are some Japanese tea farmers who produce white tea? No? I am not surprised since I did not know either. Until two years ago when I received a small sample of some large leaf (now I know is called Shou Mei) Japanese white tea. Since I have never been into white teas so much in the past (mainly because I did not know how to brew them properly & because the ones I got weren’t of a great quality) I brewed it mindlessly at work one afternoon in between meetings. You can… Read More »Japanese White Tea from Kyoto: a review

€0,00 Cart Reasons why not all Japanese powdered teas out there are matcha Read it in Spanish! It can be really hard for consumers to distinguish between a high quality matcha (抹茶) from a low level one. The fact that some tea vendors commercialize other Japanese powdered green teas (and not so green) as matcha, makes things even more complicated.  Have you ever been told that matcha is just powdered green tea? Technically, is a way to put it. However, it is all much more complex than that since matcha is the only Japanese tea that is produced in a very specific way.  If you haven’t read the article I… Read More »Reasons why not all powdered Japanese teas out there are matcha

€0,00 Cart How to make your very own dalgona matcha at home Read it in Spanish! First time I heard about dalgona (달고나) matcha, I was scrolling through Instagram looking for nice matcha treats I did no know about. Suddenly, a sort of what looked like a matcha latte topped up with tons of creamy & puffed matcha foam appeared in front of my eyes. I am not new to having milk in my green tea as you may already know. However, I have never heard of dalgona before and it looked so good! My curiosity lead me to do some research on the topic and to create my very own… Read More »How to make your very own dalgona matcha at home

€0,00 Cart Flavoured matcha you say? Oh, dear! Read it in Spanish! I have observed a trend among some matcha drinkers recently. They are buying lots of artificially flavoured matcha powders that taste like desserts, fruits & like a number of other things, such as other types of teas. There are several hundreds of flavoured teas in the market already. I guess it was a matter of time until we got flavoured matcha powders too. Oh dear! These flavoured powders, come wrapped up in highly visually appealing containers that indeed look good & therefore attract people with their bright colours & often times, sleek designs. They gravitate around those flavoured… Read More »Flavoured matcha you say? Oh, dear!

€0,00 Cart Amazing ways to repurpose your spent Japanese tea leaves Read it in Spanish! It might come to a surprise to some of you finding out that spent tea leaves of certain types of Japanese teas can be enjoyed in multiple ways after having used them to make a delicious brew. SERIOUSLY? HOW IS THAT? I found this out during my first visit to a Japanese tea farm & I thought it was a great idea. Not only because it is said that only a certain percentage of some of the components contained in the leaves are released during the hot brewing process. But also because they don’t have… Read More »Amazing ways to repurpose your spent Japanese tea leaves

€0,00 Cart Asamushi, chuumushi, fukamushi, say what? Read it in Spanish! If you are a Japanese tea lover like me you might have possibly heard these terms before. However, you might not be able to say what do they exactly mean, why are they important or what’s the difference from one to another. It can be a bit confusing. I have also been really confused back in the day, about many things related to Japanese teas, including all these terms. This is the reason why I decided to write a dedicated article about the different ways of steaming the tea leaves in Japan, to shed some light on the true… Read More »Asamushi, chuumushi, fukamushi, say what?

€0,00 Cart Reasons why buying high quality Japanese loose leaf tea will save you money! Read it in Spanish! Yes, you have read it correctly. By purchasing high quality loose leaf you will end saving money in the long run. Buying boxes of teabags might feel like it is the cheapest way to enjoy your favourite beverage. I believe otherwise. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE? Let’s do the math! Note that I will be comparing Japanese teas in this article since this is what this blog is about. You can also have a look at the teabags you usually buy (if any) & check how much a similar good quality loose… Read More »Reasons why buying high quality loose leaf tea will save you money!

€0,00 Cart Roasting Japanese green tea at home? Tell me more! Read it in Spanish! Have you ever heard or tried houjicha (ほうじ茶) before? I first tried it in Japan during my Japanese tea training course in Japan. We were served lots of cold brewed houjicha thorough the day to combat the heat. Its colour was really nice, reddish, bright, beautiful. And it was so refreshing! Almost everywhere we went to we were served a nice cup of cold brewed houjicha. You might sometimes find it written as hojicha instead. Like wakoucha or wakocha. It is the same tea, but for whatever reason there is a tendency of shortening the… Read More »Roasting Japanese green tea at home? Tell me more!

€0,00 Cart Nanbu tekki: cast iron teapot or kettle, what is the difference? Read it in Spanish! Did you know that cast iron teapots are used to brew tea? Until not that long ago I always thought that cast iron teapots weren’t made to brew tea but just to heat water & therefore they were kettles. This was until I saw a comment in one of the tea groups I belong to & I decided to do some research. What I found left me perplexed & kind of confused too. SO DO CAST IRON TEAPOTS REALLY EXIST? Yes, I also got confused myself. However, when doing the research about the… Read More »Nanbu tekki: cast iron teapot or kettle, what is the difference?

€0,00 Cart Beyond Uji & Shizuoka: tea cultivation in Japan Read it in Spanish! I was having a chat with a Japanese tea instructor recently who kindly pointed out (when I told him some Japanese people seemed not to know there are nice Japanese teas grown in Yakushima Island) that many Japanese think in Uji or Shizuoka when talking about tea, nothing else.  The interesting part of this is that there are lots of teas grown beyond Uji or Shizuoka. In fact, there are multiple tea growing regions in Japan, which produce teas of outstanding quality such as Kagoshima or Yakushima. Kagoshima is the second tea producing region after Shizuoka,… Read More »Beyond Uji & Shizuoka: tea cultivation in Japan

€0,00 Cart Ways to extend the life of your Japanese tea leaves! Read it in Spanish! Often times I get asked if there is a right way of preserving Japanese teas in order to keep them fresh for as long as possible. Truth be told, all the teas outhere no matter the type will benefit greatly from applying high standards to their storing conditions However, since Japanese teas are for the most part green & steamed, the way they are preserved has a huge impact for them to keep their freshness until the time of consumption. Matcha being the most delicate of all since it can degrade very fast due… Read More »Ways to extend the life of your Japanese tea leaves!

€0,00 Cart Japanese Tea Recipe: Matcha Tsunami Read it in Spanish! You might be wondering why I chose such a name for the recipe that I will be sharing with you today. However, once you have gone through it you will understand. And you will find it really fitting actually.  Perhaps you already know lots of things about matcha. However, for those that might be new to it or that might have discovered just recently I will make a short summary. WHAT IS MATCHA? Matcha is a really especial type of Japanese tea. Why is especial? Because it gets shaded for around three weeks before being harvested, then is converted… Read More »Japanese Tea Recipe: Matcha Tsunami

€0,00 Cart Tea review: Organic Watanabe Kabuse Shincha 2020 Read it in Spanish! Thinking in retrospective, I should have started my blog by reviewing all the teas being sold in the shop. However, since I do everything on my own, from social media to accountancy, there is always something in the way so I end talking about other tea related topics. Reviewing teas requires time, I need to sit down, take a notebook and brew for a couple of hours paying attention to every subtle detail.  I don’t really want that the blog only contains reviews of Japanese teas I sell since I also want it to have interesting articles… Read More »Tea review: Organic Watanabe Kabuse Shincha 2020