Kakegawa Yamakai

Tea: Kakegawa Yamakai - 7461
Vendor: Lupicia USA
Price: $7.00 / 50g
Source: Shizuoka, Japan
Vendor Description: This tea's clean and refreshing herbal aroma similar to a mint is very attractive. Full-bodied tea with a little stronger astringency, but with a sweet aftertaste.

I had been somewhat hesitant about trying out this tea given the description given. I really wondered if I would enjoy a tea that describes itself as having an herbal aroma similar to mint.

Leaf: The leaf for this tea looked very normal, there was a bit more variation in color than in some of the other senchas offered by Lupicia, but nothing truly out of the ordinary.

1st Infustion: The aroma for this tea was actually quite strong, I didn't really see how they could be reminded of it as being mint, but it to me was a very strong very deep and heavy sencha aroma. This seemed like this tea would be a very bold solid sencha. When first sipping this tea there is an unusual flavor to it that I could not place. It wasn't a negative taste, but a bit unusual. I'm not sure what to make of it. The flavor was very short lived as was the whole flavor of the tea. After the unusual flavor was a strong bitter sencha tang and left with no sense of astringency. The tea had a bit of a medium body to it, nothing too light nor heavy.

2nd Infusion: This infusion had a medium sense of astringency and a high sense of bitterness. It was a quite full bodied tea this time packed with bold flavor. The flavor was very deep and bold, making this a very solid sencha. I enjoyed the depth of the flavor with this infusion

Rating: 9/10

Conclusion: I really enjoyed this sencha. It was strong and bold with just the right amount of astringency and bitterness. It knew what it was doing and did it. The only thing I didn't really appreciate about this tea was the odd flavor in the beginning of the flavor and the shortness of the flavor. A bit longer flavor profile would have been nicer.