Kaneroku Matsumoto Tea Garden: Sobacha green tea

This also makes a tasty cold brew. I used 1 sachet in 500mL for 8 hours but that could probably be decreased a few hours. The resulting tea was thicker and tasted grassier, less tart and a little more bitter which gave the tea more depth. That sweet Payday candy bar smell/taste weaved its way through all of that. Very refreshing.

Summer Vacation! This is a whole leaf tea that is sold in sachets that I picked up from Yunomi, and my prediction was correct; I left myself even less time this morning than before, mainly on account of a migraine (seriously, I should’ve called in, but my job can be such a butt about it… here I am at work and still thinking I made the wrong choice, meh). The forest fire smoke is such a migraine trigger for me, it’s just awful. May still bail at lunch…

In any event, I just boiled some water, tossed one of these bags in the cup, steeped it while throwing clothes on, then removed it from the thermos before I was out the door. It’s green tea with soba, and I was expecting it to be pretty close to my beloved genmaicha. And it is, mostly, though I find it actually tastes a lot sweeter than genmaicha, which surprised me. Like there is a slightly more honeyed note toward the end of the sip, beneath that toasted cereal flavor. The green tea also has a nice, smooth, grassy flavor with no bitterness, and a very subtle lemony citrus flavor at the end of the sip. This is a nice tea that would appeal to fans of genmaicha that has some slight deviations in the flavor.

Okay to start with I normally dont drink tea bags, but this was interesting enough that I decided to make an exception and Im very glad I did. I brewed it exactly according to instructions with 200 water for 2.5 minutes. I got sweet, vegetal green liquor with a hunt of nuttiness. Its not as intensely nutty or popcorn as genmaicha, its much more subtle. There is almost a wheat like flavor in this as well. It also mellows the green flavors of the tea as well, leading to a nice mellow tea, that I highly recommend for afternoons.

Excellent tea! view less