Matchairi Genmaicha

I had iced genmaicha at a Korean restaurant near my school and finally now that I have a giant bag of genmaicha, I can make it at home. I may have to not let it steep for 16-17 hours next time because it’s somewhat strong, but it tastes pretty good!

I love that this smells like puffed wheat cereal. I’m a weirdo – that is one of my favorite cereals :)
I didn’t really notice the matcha dusting visually in the leaves.
Wow, the flavor. This is not like any tea I have had so far. Bizarre… I don’t dislike it but I am puzzled. First I am hit with a nutty puffed wheat flavor. Then a little bit of green then… metal? I am tasting a kind of light tin flavor. Imagine chewing on tin foil and then having, not that initial burst, but an aftertaste of that. I feel it right at my gumline behind my teeth… so weird. Even weirder is, I don’t dislike it. Weird… weird weird weird.
More sips.
Now I can kind of taste that matcha. It’s faint. I get more of it if I kind of do the wine tasting thing and incorporate air with the sip (aka “slurping”).
Tin flavored tea. I honestly have no idea what I think of this. I’m still drinking it and it’s interesting.

The name on this was one was very tiny so I didn’t realize it had matcha in it. I did notice the leaves were a little dusted, but it wasn’t a shocking green like Teavana’s Gyokuro Matcha. I’ve only had a couple genmaicha’s and this one is by far my favorite. Yes at first it tastes like burnt popcorn, but this gets really smooth and buttery and its just very yummy. In fact I based my dinner on it, ramen with roasted veggies and soy crisps. Resteeped well a second time. Yum. Thanks Amanda!

As Genmaicha teas go, this one is very tasty and authentic. When you look at this tea you will see it has green leaves, brown rice (really just roasted white rice) and popped rice that are white and look like little popcorn puffs (try one- it is delicious!). “Gen-mai” means the roasted rice, and “cha” is tea. When getting teas like this it is a good idea to go to asian distributors and markets because these places carry the “real thing,” what Japanese people themselves drink. Finding a label on the bag that says “imported by Yamama Matsuden Co. Ltd.” or “Made in Japan” is very important so as to not get fooled.

Japanese green teas are meant to be steeped for shorter times and at lower temperatures than black teas or red teas. Don’t steep it for more than 5 minutes- and much shorter than that is best. For stronger tea, use more tea leaves instead of brewing longer, because if you brew green tea too long it turns brown and develops a bitter taste. When making it iced, which you can very well do, you must use more tea leaves and brew for much longer, however. With ice water, a good brew time is 10 minutes. You want the tea to be a pretty and mellow green color, same as when it it hot. Judge when the tea is ready by the color, not the time passed. This is a surefire way to get tasty tea, every time.