Covered Sencha Okumidori | Wazuka, Kyoto

Sweetness (umami): ★★★★ Astringency: ★ Color: ★★★★ The highest quality Saemidori single-origin tea leaves are produced in Wazuka Town, Kyoto Prefecture. This variety was created by crossing "Yabukita" with "Asatsuyu", a type of natural gyokuro. This is an excellent variety that is considered to be the highest quality sencha. As its name suggests, the tea leaves have a beautiful, vibrant, clear green color. As it is said to be the highest quality variety, the first brew is a vivid, clear green. Furthermore, it has almost no astringency and is filled with a rich, sweet, and full-bodied flavor. In the second brew, the tea leaves open up and the green color becomes deeper and more beautiful. The rich flavor and sweetness of the tea also reveal a crisp, tea-like side. You can enjoy the delicious flavor of Saemidori even after the third brew, and as you raise the temperature of the water you can also enjoy the crispness. We recommend you pour it strong. "Kyoto Wazuka" For 800 years, Wazuka Town in Kyoto has been carrying on tradition, cultivating tea fields and consistently producing the highest quality tea. Wazuka has a climate with large temperature differences between day and night, which is prone to fog and helps block direct sunlight, making it extremely suitable for cultivating tea. ・Characteristics of Kabusecha It is a type of Japanese tea that is somewhere between Sencha and Gyokuro. It is cultivated in the same way as Gyokuro, by covering the tea to block out direct sunlight. The period for which gyokuro is covered is around 20 days, while kabusecha is covered for about one week. (YUGEN's kabusecha is covered for 14 to 20 days. The tea leaves are carefully selected and grown by tea farmers with great care by hand.) As a result, it is a Japanese tea that has the sweetness and umami of Gyokuro, as well as the flavor of Sencha. Also, the ingredients that are extracted vary depending on the temperature of the water; when brewed at a lukewarm temperature, it has a strong sweetness and umami flavor similar to gyokuro, while when brewed at a hotter temperature, you can enjoy the refreshing astringency of sencha. For this reason, we recommend that you brew the tea at about 60-70 degrees for the first infusion, and then raise the temperature by about 10 degrees from the second infusion onwards to enjoy the difference in taste. The benefits of Kabuse tea Kabusecha is rich not only in the catechins found in tea, but also in theanine, a type of amino acid that has antioxidant properties and is great for relaxation, and vitamin C.