Feels like green creatine.
Green tea » Japanese » Shade-Grown, ★★★★★
Also known as: 抹茶
Brewed simply in a glass with a spoon, Matcha reminded me of taking creatine powder that doesn’t quite dissolve in water. I usually care deeply about how tea is brewed, but Matcha needed too much specialist equipment, so I went without. The right-sized bowl and the hand-made Matcha whisk sell for over $80 per set here in Melbourne so I didn’t buy them. I used a spoon and my usual tea-glass, and had what felt like an energy drink that was unpleasant to swallow.
Brewed as part of a beautiful, calming Matcha ceremony, though, this tea is totally different. The gentle, meticulous process of preparing Matcha feels like meditation. Using the appropriate equipment (the right-sized bowl and the hand-made bamboo whisk) give the Matcha a pleasantly smooth mouthfeel with a froth that amplifies the flavour of the drink (rather like that of espresso coffee). Whisking the Matcha properly also removes all the unpleasant, tiny clumps of tea-powder that a teaspoon would fail to remove. The ceremony makes this tea worth two more of my stars.
Watch the a demonstration of the ceremony here:
Watch the ceremony itself here:
The fact that it’s shade-grown and then powdered means that it’s richer in everything (antioxidants, caffeine, catechins, vitamins and protein—yes, protein) than all other teas. It’s a natural energy drink that stimulates you much more than brewed teas because you’re effectively swallowing all of the leaf.
Matcha can be brewed two ways: thick (濃茶, koicha) and thin (薄茶, usucha). Methods of each preparation method are detailed here.
The Matcha ceremony is worthwhile. Even if you don’t kneel on the floor and brew it in traditional dress, at least fork out a good Matcha set to do this drink justice. Matcha sets are $80 in stores, or just $25 on eBay. ★★★★★
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James Kennedy 
How very interesting! Thank you…. I would love to try some, fascinated by the ritual and intrigued by the taste
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It’s awesome. There are two ways to make it—surprisingly, the ‘thin’ way ‘feels’ thicker because it’s frothy.
Helps both brain and digestion.
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Is there a taste you could liken it to? I imagine it tastes grassy or like fresh hay… but I’m probably wrong!
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Pandanas (another dark green leaf) and Gyokuro (tea) are very similar to Matcha.
Tastewise, I’d say it resembles vegetal, kelpy, seaweed. But I generally prefer to describe the feeling of tea, not just the taste. The prominent feature of Matcha is not its taste, but how you feel when you prepare it, and the clear, invigorating feeling you get after drinking it.
Not particularly grassy—it tastes too slippery and steamed to be that. And not particularly like fresh hay—maybe roasted teas would be grassy/hay-ey?
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