Teabag - Yame Sencha

Tea: Yame Sencha
Vendor: Bassaro
Source: Yame, Japan

This is probably one of the most inventive forms of a teabag that I have seen to date. It's almost dificult to call this a teabag. It arrived individually wrapped and looking rather normal, at least until I opened the bag. The teabag is rectangular with two die cut paper/cardstock rectangles attached one on each side.

The first thing you do when setting this teabag up is tear open the top, which is a perforated seal so the paper material of the teabag tears nicely. Then you pop out each of the sides which form paper hooks with which to hang on the opposite sides of the cup, as seen above. The remaining stock folds nicely to form a square brewing vessel area in the middle of the cup for the tea.

You then brew the tea by pouring your water into the middle of the suspended teabag. This acts much in the same way that using a strainer to brew tea would. The teabag is held at an appropriate level to allow for the tea to further brew after all the water is poured in. Unfortunately there is no easy way to promote water flow in the same way that dipping and pulling a traditional teabag in a cup would. I tried pulling this teabag up, but it doesn't work quite as well as a traditional teabag. Also the use of paper for the teabag material made it more difficult for water to flow. The material used by most other teabags now would provide better water flow.

The tea itself was rather good. The first infusion had a very sweet and smooth flavor to it, a bit reminiscent of a gyokuro, but still retaining sencha qualities. The aftertaste was a bit reminiscent of the Ariake Yutakamidori I had earlier. There was no bitterness or astringency and it had a light grassy taste to it. There were finishing hints of a seaweed flavor.

The second infusion had a stronger sense of seaweed to it and just enough of a sense of astringency to provide a clean feeling when finished. The flavor had hints of being vegetal as well.

Rating: 7/10

Conclusion: While the form of this new teabag was quite inventive, i'm dubious as to the effectiveness it would have in replacing current teabags. Most of the time I use a teabag i'm warming my water in a microwave or something of the sort so it is not convenient to pour water over the top of the teabag. The tea itself was quite good, surprisingly so for a teabag. I found that brewing the tea has a better result than a traditional teabag, but only if you can pour water over it.

Gyokuro Hoshino Seichaen

Tea: Gyokuro Hoshino Seichaen
Vendor: Bassaro
Source: Hoshino Seichaen, Yame, Japan

This was another sample from Bassaro that I got to try out. After the previous sample I was very excited to try this one.

The appearance of the leaves for this gyokuro were quite different than the previous ones. While the other gyokuro had a more matte appearance to the leaves, these have a shinier, more polished look to them. The tea also shared the very dark appearance to the leaves.

The first infusion had a very strong grassy vegetal/flavor to it. The color of the infusion was also a lot lighter than the other gyokuro. This one was still cloudy and a deep shade of green, but not as much so. The flavor of the tea was also very bold, but this one was more of a combination of a vegetal/grassy flavor instead of the more vegetal flavor of the other. The taste is bold and full bodied with a flavor that is an experience for the whole mouth, not just isolated to parts of the tongue. There were also a few hints of seaweed in the taste.

The second infusion was a bit sweeter in flavor, with the sweetness in the initial portion of the flavor, which then tapers into the rich gyokuro flavor. This extraction was more interesting and multidimensional than the previous.

The third infusion still had a strong vegetal flavor, but not as much of a rich gyokuro flavor. It was also starting to build a bit of astringency which hadn't been present in the previous two infusions.

The next infusion the vegetal flavor was starting to taper down a bit and the astringency had climbed to a medium level.

The fifth and final infusion was still as delicious as the first one, simply with a different flavor to it, the flavors were a bit weaker, but it allowed to taste some of the more subtle portions of the flavor instead of being masked by more powerful flavors. At this point though it had mustered a high sense of astringency.

Rating: 10/10

Conclusion: This was another remarkable gyokuro which seemed for a while that it would not stop producing wonderful flavors and more and more infusions. It seemed like this one might be a bit more difficult to brew than the other, but still produced a wonderful cup of tea. Both were excellent teas that I would recommend to anyone.

Gyokuro Koga Chagyo

Tea: Gyokuro
Vendor: Bassaro
Source: Koga Chagyo, Yame, Japan
Vendor Notes: Appelation Kurogi Controlee

While i'm not sure what product on their online shop this sample I received from them corresponds to, I will do my best to do this wonderful tea justice.

Firstly the sample came in a small mylar sealed package containing 6g of gyokuro leaf. It is a bit difficult to see in the picture above, but the leaf itself was even gorgeous, it was a beautiful shade of dark green and has a certain allure to it which I cannot begin to describe.

For the purposes of this review I brewed the gyokuro with 30ml (it really was a tiny amount of water) infusions starting at 50C (122F) working my way up in temperature. These were the suggested brewing instructions given with this tea. This is cooler than I am used to starting gyokuro with, normally starting around 150F(65C). I then increased the temperature gradually on subsequent infusions.

The first infusion of this tea (shown below) was very dark and rich in color. Due to the relatively low temperature there was not much of an aroma to the tea at this point. The flavor was rich and vegetal. It was very bold, but at the same time a relatively shortlived flavor. It was an amazing Gyokuro flavor in a concise burst with no aftertaste.

The first infusion on its own was a wonderful experience, but then I was shocked on the second infusion. This infusion was very similar to the first in appearance, dark and cloudy. It also had the same rich gyokuro flavor, and this time it had a slight astringency and a light bitterness to it. It was still rich and vegetal with a concise flood of flavor.

Just when I thought that this tea was amazing, I got to try the third infusion. This one was an emerald green color, having washed out most of the smaller particles out during the first two infusions. This time the flavor switched from being vegetal to a grassier flavor, but still full of flavor with no signs of letting up. The sense of astringency was growing though, this time up to a medium level.

Showing no signs of letting up this tea produced a fourth infusion. This one was a little lighter in flavor, but the flavor was sweeter, showcasing that sense of natural sweetness which Gyokuro is well known for. The astringency did build up even further this time though.

By the fifth infusion the tea had become a lighter flavor, but showed an amazing pairing of sweetness and the grassy/vegetal flavor exhibited earlier on in the tastings. The flavor was starting to show lightening up at this point.

The final infusion, which I almost expected to have given up by now, was still amazing. It was a much lighter green color and didn't have nearly as much power as before, it still possessed a wonderful flavor and at this point transitioned into tasting almost like a wonderful sencha.

Rating: 10/10

Conclusion: This is an amazing sample of gyokuro. It lasted for significantly longer than I expected showing all sides of the flavor of gyokuro. Each infusion showed a brilliant character which if a tea produced only that flavor alone would still be amazing. These all came from one sample of tea though. If I could get some, I would order this to be the most special of special occasion gyokruos.

Thank You - Bassaro

Today I would like to send a big THANK YOU to Bassaro for sending me some amazing samples. They sell primarily gyokuro (although they have a few other Japanese green tea products, matcha, sencha, and powdered sencha). They were also kind enough to send along a few "teabags" to sample. While these are not truly teabags, they do have the same portability as them. Their Gyokuro comes from two farms in Yame, Hoshino Seichaen and Koga Chagyo, and farmers through JA Yame. This company is based out of France though, so for us in the US, we are not fortunate enough to be able to just pick up some tea from these guys very easily.