Monday, January 28, 2008

Uji Shincha 2007

Tea: Uji Shincha 2007 6530
Vendor: Lupicia USA
Source: Uji, Japan

After reviewing the Sayama Shincha 2007 from Lupicia I was quite excited to try out the Shincha from Uji. Uji is a famous region of Japan well known for its tea. The Nara Tsukigase is also from an area close to Uji and that also was a very good tea so I had high expectations for the Uji Shincha. I was actually quite disappointed.

The aroma and color to the tea was nothing special, it had a very faint grassy scent, but it was very weak and actually somewhat mundane.

The taste of the tea started off with a somewhat weak start and worked its way up and left with a medium sense of astringency. There was no bite to it as there is with many sencha teas, and to be honest no bitterness at all. The flavor for this tea was very hard to notice very much and left much to be desired.

Rating: 3/10

Conclusion: I expected more from this particular tea, but it looks like I was disappointed. All the aspects I was hoping to see in this tea were lacking or not even present. It was a very mundane experience. Not recommended at all.

2 comments:

Wes Crosswhite said...

Lucipia has some interesting looking stuff, but it's all fairly cheap and I wouldn't be surprised to learn all of it isn't on par. What you have there is a shincha from 2007, which now is almost a year old. That may be why it's not longer so loveable.

Eric said...

I agree completely, although what struck me as most surprising was the comparison between the Sayama Shincha and the Uji Shincha. Both should be the same age, but there was a significant difference in quality.