Shincha Houryoku

The postal carrier delivered this to my doorstep this morning, and I wasted no time in preparing a cup in my new kyusu. I’ll write more later, but my first impressions are:
-This is a very GREEN, green tea. The liquor, the scent, the taste, everything.
-Thick, rich, savory, vegetable broth-like flavor
-Lots of umami.
-Sweet/tingly sort of aftertaste that lingers
-No bitterness, but a strong vegetal flavor.
-In comparison with the Hashiri shincha, this one is stronger and has more umami. Hashiri was flavorful but had a more delicate, hard-to-pin down sort of flavor. I like them both, and I think anyone who likes sencha and gyokuro would like both of these teas.

I will write more after the second steep….

Sampling a little of this right now and it’s quite pure!

It’s a light lime green in color and it tastes like a smooth buttered-veggies. No strange aftertaste.

Thumbs Up!

So I recently tried 5 different fukamushis, took notes each day, and now I’m ready to post the results and rank them! I used as equal parameters as possible to eliminate factors that could have affected the flavor or results. I am no expert or scientist; plus the results pretty much lined up with the cost of each tea, so there’s no big suprises here either!
(I’m going to put only the tasting note for each tea involved under the steepster profile of that tea, but the results I’ll include on each one).

Shincha Houryoku
6 oz + 2 heaping tsp leaf
1st – 160, 30scds: The brewed leaf was a really pleasing, beautiful color; it looked like fresh leaves just picked (though it was very small pieces of course, because the steaming breaks it up like that). The initial flavor was almost exactly like the hashiri shincha, that young, somewhat bitter then sweet flavor that tasted very fresh. This tea seemed at first just like a more mature hashiri shincha. However, this gave way to a pure, powerful, mouth filling, broth-like umami, which was very different than the hashiri. Don’t imagine it tasted like ramen broth, but imagine it tasted like delicious tea, and had the same wonderful feel and effects of the most delicious, (even sweet) broth you’ve drunk. Yes, I could describe it the same many do, ‘vegetal’, but it was still tea. It was like all the richness you get from cheesecake or some other dessert, without being sugary, or giving you the feeling that you’d get sick after a couple of bites. You could drink cup after cup and experience that delicious richness without becoming sick in the process. So good!
2nd – 180, 15scds: I got 5 steepings from this, and 2-4 were also very good. The flavor slowly changed in each one, but was good for different reasons. I remember the 2nd having still a lot of that pure, almost thick flavor…almost as if you could eat it. It wasn’t as powerful as the 1st steeping, but had a bit more of the lingering sweetness at the end. By steepings 3 and 4, I remember the initial flavor being excellent, a delicious bitterness that quickly transformed to intense sweetness. After that dissipated, there wasn’t much flavor left in the taste, but was overall very good for being the 3rd and 4th steeping.

Drumroll please…

1. Shincha Houryoku (Den’s)
2. Fukamushi Sencha Yame (Den’s)
3. Sen Cha (Sugimoto USA)
4. Fukamushi Sencha Special (Den’s)
5. Ocha-Zanmai Fukamushi (Yamamotoyama)

This is a very tasty tea that I’ve enjoyed immensely so far. I get notes of apricots and plums from the raw leaf; which is deep steamed, slightly dusty, and extremely fragrant. I’ve got 4/5 solid steepings out of each session so far — the longest I’ve ever been able to “stretch” any of Den’s teas.

The first cup tastes smooth and vegetal, with a hint of that buttery umami taste that I usually get from gyokuro. Lower temperatures help to bring bring out that umami flavor; which usually peaks around the 2nd or 3rd dense, jade cup. This is when its astringency starts to shine through, but it doesn’t become overbearing until the fourth or fifth cup. Later steepings make for a surprisingly flavorful iced tea!

Wow, this tea is really good. Fresh, almost citrus leaf smell, good dry leaf color and nice bright green brewed color. Tea is sweet but with strong umami.

From my frozen stash.
I thawed the tea out before steeping. (For about the time for boil and cool to proper temp)
Used about 3.5 oz. of water.
Poured it out of the kyusu in the method recommended by Dens Tea (a little at a time)
Probably need to speed this part up because the tea had a bitter/astringent character not normally found in early teas.
Rich “green” aroma, heavy umami finish with the astringency noted earlier.
Second pot with a bit more water and faster pouring yielded a nicer cup.
I guess the lessonl is that if you want color – pour slow but you’ll have a bitter cup.

2010 version: Quite strong (and interesting) roast green bean, spinach and seaweed elements here. Good lift, remains fresh even with the strength of flavour and aroma.

Price: $19.75 for 56g
Buy Again: Maybe

~1.25 tsp
~160-165 degrees F
30s, 30s, 1min