Japanese Tea

The 6 major strands of tea (including Japanese tea) are primarily obtained by bringing oxidation to a halt at a desired level. (See Tea, Tea, and Tea). When monks brought back tea from China to Kyoto / Uji, the Japanese were quick to adopt and refine one particular approach to stop oxidation. To this very day, they use steam instead of dry heat (e.g. panning, baking, firing) to deactivate the enzymes that would otherwise turn the vibrant green tea leaves into those used for black tea.

[Note: Some sources date Japan’s first experience with tea to 700AD and pinpoint the introduction of the steaming element to around 900AD. The majority, however, credit Zen priest Eisai with bringing both Buddhism and green tea to Japan in 1191, and attribute the idea of applying steam to freshly picked tea leaves to Nagatani Soen in 1738. The first tee trees, a well-informed source tells me, were planted on a 600m stretch in Obuku, Ujitawara. It just so happens that this plot is located in a misty climate with sloping hills, warm days and cool nights, i.e. the most ideal setting for Camellia Sinensis. In her book, ‘Tea Stories: Japan‘, Ausra Burg, owner of the London shop My Cup of Tea, adopts a stance in between the aforementioned dates and credits the introduction of Chinese tea seeds in Japan to Buddhist monks Kukai and Saicho at the beginning of the 9th century. Her source names Ujitawara as the place where the Japanese applied steam for the first time].

[Second note: The Japanese were not even the first to take to matcha, as a Chinese native insisted to point out. Indeed, as with so many other things in the world, the Chinese invented it before. Unlike them, however, the Japanese have elevated both the production and the serving of matcha to an art. As this article here (Japanese vs Chinese Matcha) shows, there is indeed a marked difference, and it already starts with the fact that the plants in China are not shaded before harvesting for matcha takes place).