Sakura no Kocha (Black Tea with Cherry Leaves)

A small tin of this tea and the green tea variety from the same company was gifted to me from Todd after his Japan trip in 2018. Thank you Todd!

I love sakura flavored things, but I really dislike the “salt pickling/preserving” method Japan typically uses on the sakura leaves. I had this issue with Lupicia’s teas, and after squinting terribly to make out the absolutely tiny kanji on the back of the tin to get the ingredients for these teas, they are also salt-pickled sakura leaves. Bah. So, I already know I will probably only use these teas for food preparation (flavoring smoothie milk, rice water, ramen broth). But I still feel obliged to sample at least one cup of each plain.

I can’t really remember now what the base of Lupicia’s Sakura Black was like, but this one is a very tiny and fine leafed Assam, so it has quite a bit of body to it. It’s quite malty and brisk with a bit of astrigent bite left on the tongue after the sip. I’m getting a strong grape flavor I was not expecting; I normally taste that with jasmine, but I’m really tasting it here. Perhaps something about the floral and some raisiny notes from the Assam are combining to make that distinct “grape” taste in my mouth; it isn’t unpleasant! But because that grape taste is so forward, I don’t really taste that distinct floral/cherry sakura taste until near the end of the sip. The salt isn’t too aggregious during the sip, but does leave this sort of metallic aftertaste on my tongue that I find pretty unpleasant. With the astrigent and metallic bite at the end of the sip, I’ll probably latte this in the future, which I remember worked pretty well for me with the Lupicia sakura teas to smooth out the flavors I didn’t like from salt preserving the sakura leaves.

The aroma is great. Sipping as a plain cup, it’s a bit abrasive. And it tastes more grapey than sakura-like. My favorite sakura black tea I’ve tried thus far is the one from Creha tea, available through Yunomi.