Tea type
Green Tea
Ingredients
Green Tea
Flavors
Autumn Leaf Pile, Butter, Grain, Nuts, Roasted, Roasted Nuts, Smooth, Wood, Grass, Hay, Mineral, Toasty, Woody, Floral, Toast, Ash
Sold in
Loose Leaf
Caffeine
Low
Certification
Not available
Edit tea info Last updated by Cameron B.
Average preparation
195 °F / 90 °C 1 min, 45 sec 5 g 9 oz / 259 ml

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8 Tasting Notes View all

  • “Ooh I wish I had thought to blend this with the Java Momma Green Daydream, both from the Strange VariaTea TTB! It has an almost chocolate-y roast, which might go really well with the vanilla of...” Read full tasting note
    90
  • “Sipdown! (43 | 390) I’ve been slacking on my Obubu teas lately, too many things to sipdown at once! Plus, you know, it would certainly help if I’d stop buying tea… ^^’ Anyway, this is a...” Read full tasting note
    82
  • “I love this like I love any houjicha. It does taste a little ‘cleaner’ compared to most houjicha, like, I dunno, less on the earthy side, more on the peanut-butter-toast side. I don’t know that I’d...” Read full tasting note
  • “I’m completely stunned at how gentle this hojicha is! It’s not smoky at all – the leaves smelled slightly green dry, toasty warmed and post steep. The taste of the tea reminds me of a seed mix I...” Read full tasting note
    85

From Kyoto Obubu Tea Farms

Hojicha Gold is a delicate tea, made by roasting spring Sencha tea leaves. It is exquisite in color and aromatic in fragrance, with a gently roasted buttery sunflower taste. Its mellow elegance makes it a perfect meal accompaniment. It is low in caffeine and therefore also an enchanting evening tea.

Taste: Umami
Body: Medium
Texture: Rounded
Length: Medium
Harvest: May
Tea Cultivar: Mixed
Origin: Wazuka
Cultivation: Unshaded
Processing: Lightly Steamed, Rolled, Dried, Roasted

About Kyoto Obubu Tea Farms View company

It started with a single cup of tea. As the legend goes, our president Akihiro Kita, or Akky-san, visited Wazuka, Kyoto one fateful day. At the time, Akky-san was still a college student in search for life's calling. After trying the region's famous Ujicha (literally meaning tea from the Uji district), he immediately fell in love and his passion for green tea was born. He had finally found what he was looking for in that one simple cup of tea. After fifteen years of learning to master the art of growing tea from tea farmers in Wazuka, Kyoto Obubu Tea Farms was born and as they say, the rest is history. So what's an Obubu? Obubu is the Kyoto slang for tea. Here in the international department we call ourselves Obubu Tea. That's "Tea Tea" for the bilinguals. We love tea so much, we just had to have it twice in our name. Now Obubu means more than just tea to us. It means, family, friends, passion and the place we call home. More than just tea. Though the roots of Obubu stem from tea, it has become more than that over the years. Obubu is an agricultural social venture, operating with three (1) bring quality Japanese tea to the world (2) contribute to the local and global community through tea (3) revitalize interest in tea and agriculture through education.

8 Tasting Notes

90
1146 tasting notes

Ooh I wish I had thought to blend this with the Java Momma Green Daydream, both from the Strange VariaTea TTB! It has an almost chocolate-y roast, which might go really well with the vanilla of that tea. I might add some Daydream to the resteep. 

ETA: I did try that, but it didn’t really live up to my hopes – possibly the ratio was off? The houjicha overwhelmed the marshmallow vanilla of the Daydream.

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82
3986 tasting notes

Sipdown! (43 | 390)

I’ve been slacking on my Obubu teas lately, too many things to sipdown at once! Plus, you know, it would certainly help if I’d stop buying tea… ^^’

Anyway, this is a scrumptious hojicha! It’s apparently made from a spring sencha instead of the traditional bancha. I’m not sure I would know that necessarily, it doesn’t taste more vegetal than usual. But it does strike a nice balance of roasty, nutty, buttery, a touch woody, with plenty of nice autumnal dry leaf notes.

I always have a difficult time finding the subtleties of hojicha and roasted teas in general, but it’s tasty! Not sure I would necessarily order it over their other hojicha varieties. But that’s a non-issue since I still have plenty more hojicha backlog to sip through! :P

Flavors: Autumn Leaf Pile, Butter, Grain, Nuts, Roasted, Roasted Nuts, Smooth, Wood

Preparation
190 °F / 87 °C 1 min, 0 sec 5 g 7 OZ / 200 ML

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76 tasting notes

I love this like I love any houjicha. It does taste a little ‘cleaner’ compared to most houjicha, like, I dunno, less on the earthy side, more on the peanut-butter-toast side. I don’t know that I’d necessarily prefer it over the basic houjicha, but I wouldn’t mind having it in my houjicha rotation for some variety.

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85
27 tasting notes

I’m completely stunned at how gentle this hojicha is! It’s not smoky at all – the leaves smelled slightly green dry, toasty warmed and post steep. The taste of the tea reminds me of a seed mix I use for my oatmeal, and leaves a strong floral finish across the tongue! I’m really loving it, although it doesn’t have nearly the richness I look for in a hojicha. Kinda thinking about buying more to experiment with…

Flavors: Floral, Toast

Preparation
200 °F / 93 °C 1 min, 0 sec 5 g 8 OZ / 236 ML

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306 tasting notes

This is the last of the Obubu sampler I got around to trying. I have to say this may have been my least favorite of their Houjicha. Despite it is made from a higher quality leaf, in this case their Sencha of the Summer Sun rather than bancha, the flavor did not seem more enjoyable to me. This Houjicha Gold is dominated by top notes. Everything registered really high and light on the patate. The darker tones I am used to enjoying with houjicha weren’t there and the body seemed very thin. I got some of the sunflower seed notes and a bit of other light hay-like flavors, but there was also a very strong ashy flavor like cigar ash that resulted even after brewing for only 1 minute with a 2.5g/100ml ratio. To me this tea tasted overly roasted. It’s strange because one of the teas I like more from Obubu is their Dark Roast Houjicha, which despite being roasted more heavily seems to have more mellow notes with a hint of sweetness among the roasty tastes.

Having glanced at some of the other reviews here, I’m kind of surprised I didn’t experience any of the caramel or floral-like notes. Having had Sencha of the Summer Sun before I would have expected some interesting more fragrant notes, but they weren’t present for me.

UPDATE: I have just learned that houjicha is usually brewed for 30 seconds instead of 1 minute, so I will write another review of this when I have more of this tea and can brew it for less time. I plan to order the Obubu Tea Sampler again soon because I enjoyed so many of the teas in it.

Flavors: Ash, Roasted

Preparation
185 °F / 85 °C 1 min, 0 sec 5 g 7 OZ / 200 ML

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2816 tasting notes

Still working my way throguh the Obubu sampler pack…

I don’t believe I’ve ever had a hojicha made from roasted sencha before. I saw that this should have been steeped for less time than a regular hoji after I started steeping it…. so I steeped mine for 3.5 minutes. I hope that wasn’t too long. :-/

This has a definite roasty smell and seems lighter in flavor than your normal hoji. I am getting notes of caramel, coffee and a bit floral. Unfortunately I think I might have overbrewed this because I also get a bitterness in the finish that I am not really enjoying. I wish I had more of this to play around with but won’t rate it for now. FAIL!

Preparation
Boiling 3 min, 30 sec

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97
4843 tasting notes

Backlog:

A really tasty Houjicha! I love the roasty-toasty, nutty flavor of this. This is one of the very best Houjicha – if not THE best Houjicha – that I’ve yet to try. This is top-notch!

In addition to the roasted nutty flavor, I also tasted lovely notes of golden caramel and even the slightest floral tone which I found unique about this tea.

Sweet and savory, with a savory note arriving at about mid-sip. It’s that contrast that really makes this an exciting Houjicha for me, usually a houjicha is sweet but only sweet with it’s roasty-toasty nutty flavors … but the slight sharpness that I get from the flowery taste here really perks up the palate when it hits.

Here’s my full-length review: http://sororiteasisters.com/2014/02/22/hoji-cha-gold-houjicha-gold-from-kyoto-obubu-tea-plantations/

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