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This will be the first sencha tea to brew and review in my new tokonome kyusu, which is absolutely gorgeous (and my first kyusu). I bought an expensive one because I wanted to be set with one that was really my tastes and not be tempted to buy another down the road. If anyone is curious, it’s this one: http://www.amazon.com/Japanese-teapot-Tokoname-Umehara-7-78oz/dp/B00CD8NPTU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1413654555&sr=8-1&keywords=kyusu+shoji

Anyhow, on to the tea. The scent of Sencha of Brightness is intoxicating after letting the leaves sit in the warm kyusu for a minute. The smell is of sweet corn on the cob, peony flowers and toasted almonds. It’s smelling eerily similar to my all time favorite tea, Kenyan Silver Needle. Let’s see how it brews up.

The brew is a delicate spring green. The taste is sublime. It has an incredibly smooth mouthfeel… and this may sound weird but the texture reminds me of yogurt. It’s velvety and thick. The flavor has a mellow nutty start that changes to a slightly green and vegetal one with afternotes of cooling mint sensation. I can easily see why this Sencha of Brightness was named from the idea of sparkling light reflecting on cooling waters. The tea is very mellow with almost no astringency, only a slight bit in the finish.

On the second infusion the taste is much more mild. It’s still quite sweet and there are little notes of seaweed and grass like one might expect from sencha. The third infusion is also rather light in flavor and tastes similar to the second. I may have used a lower amount of leaf than I should have.

This tea was humbling. I really like it a lot.