Ito En is, I think, the only company to be brave enough to attempt to expand their tea market to the States. I haven’t tried many of the Teas’ Teas because, as far as bottled drinks go, they are not too cheap, but when I am taken with a feeling of nostalgia, I will often give in and buy one.
In Japan, the Oi Ocha series, which I am going to go ahead and say corresponds to the Teas’ Tea series because I enjoy making claims that I can’t back up and have no basis for, costs a buck fitty, which is to say, exactly as much as any other bottled tea, so it was inevitable that I would get to them eventually. Today, I was in the mood for something different so I grabbed me some hoji-cha, which, I guess is roasted green tea.
I haven’t had hoji-cha in a while, so I have no idea whether this is a problem with this particular tea or with hoji-cha in general, but there is something massively off in the the immediate aftertaste of this tea (although it resolves itself after a bit). Basically, I get resin out of it, which is…not very tasty. Otherwise, it’s definitely got a roasted aroma to it, actually, on greater thought it basically ONLY has the roasted aroma to it, with the resin coming in at the end. All in all, I am not impressed with this stuff.
Still, as I said, i don’t know whether that’s because this hoji-cha in particular is shoddy or whether I simply do not like hoji-cha. An intelligent person, a person possessing common sense, would take note of the plethora of other kinds of tea available to them and simply play it safe by refraining from trying other hoji-chas. I, however, am neither of those kinds of people! Moreover, I have a MISSION to catalog the bottled iced teas of Japan and no matter how HARD or UNTASTY it gets, Steeples, I will PERSEVERE. Because that is the TRUE MEANING of Christmas.