Genmai Cha

I love genmaicha! It’s really hard to go wrong with this type of tea. It reminds me of the toasted rice at the bottom of the pot back before my parents got a rice cooker. They would pour boiling water over the toasted rice to get it to unstick from the pot, which created a kind of toasted rice porridge, which was amazing! And my grandma would sometimes scrap up the toasted rice and squeeze it into balls like a toasty onigiri.

Obviously, I have very fond memories of toasted rice. :) The rice also hides whatever flaws exist in the tea. This particular tea is easily astringent, but the rice makes up for it. I could probably drink this for breakfast. It seems so filling even though it’s just liquid. :D

Thanks Tamm! I can always use more japanese teas in my life.

I saw this today at my local Chinese store. I had to laugh later when I realized that I had bought 10 oz of this tea! I thought that it said 10g. Not really the same thing. I was very, very cheap at only $3.79 for the 10oz. I also purchased my first Pu-erh! It’s a birds nest shaped toucha that simply says “Yunnan The Toucha.” I really can’t find what brand it is. Maybe someone here would know.
This isn’t a bad genmaicha. It’s nice and roasty. I’m eating an apple with it so it’s all crunchy up in here! lol I think that it’s not my favorite b/c it needs some more green-ness to the profile imo. I think that this would be great for daily drinking; which is why the price tag seems right to me. Next time I’m steeping for 2 min instead of 3.
also followers :)
If anyone would like to try some of this for a trade or otherwise I’d love help consuming this! I have a ton of tea and don’t know if I can make it through this much of one tea. :p

Loose
Appearance: sorghum and rice noticeable, balanced blend with the bancha
Aroma when Dry: sweet (eastern) nutty, slightly toasty. Rice notes
After water is first poured: nutty, toasty,
At end of first steep: nutty, toasty, earthy, sweet (eastern) chewy
Tea liquor:
At beginning of steep: light green
At end of steep: mossy, foresty green
Staple? Type yes, will buy this brand again gladly
Preferred time of day: any, could drink buckets of this
Taste:
At first: nutty, toasty, earthy, sweet (eastern) chewy, hints of floral
As it cools? gets a bit buttery, slighty sour tang, a bit more floral less chewy, keeps other notes
Additives used (milk, honey, sugar etc)? No
Lingers? Yes, all notes stay, it gets slightly creamy, mildly like chestnuts

Also good chilled

I’ve been avoiding this one but I’ve had too much good tea today and I want the canister this one’s been in for something else.
This tea is pretty flat but sufficently toasty. It’s very temperature sensitive; A hair over 180 F and it sours with a spiteful fury. I use it for cooking too. Genmaica chocolate is is something most people love, if only for the entertainment value. That is, when I can save enough from myself to give to someone. XD

different. fun. not a total green tea fan, but fun regardless.

I’ve only had a couple of different varieties genmai cha, and this one is good in my opinion. After several brewings, I find it is very important to keep the amount of leaves at a tablespoon or less per pot, or else the flavor becomes heavy in the vegetal direction quite quickly. I’ve been using water that is a little cooler than I typically use for green teas, and if I am careful to use a scant tablespoon of leaves brewed at 1 minute, I get a satisfying result.

The leaves look like a (typical?) Japanese green tea, deep forest-green in long pieces, some broken, some stems, speckled throughout with walnut-brown grains of toasted rice, with an occasional piece puffed-up reminiscent of popcorn. The leaves have a satin-like shine when held in the light.

The tea, ideally brewed, has a buttery beginning with moments of fresh-cut grass and tannins and ends with a hearty nuttiness from the toasted rice. The aftertaste is a little pithy and tends toward sour and bitter, somewhat like the aftertaste of grapefruit. Leaf aroma is nutty and citrus-like, and the brew has a vegetal and buttery aroma.

I think this tea would be best suited to lunch and midday use; I think it would go well as an accompaniment to “fresh” and “light” flavors, such as salads with vinegar- or citrus-based dressings, or with yeasty breads or sandwiches on breads that tend toward yeasty or nutty versus malty. I’m not sure I would like this tea paired with sweets or strong, hearty, savory flavors—with the possible exception of very dark or unsweetened chocolate in small amounts. (I think there are some common-points in the aftertaste that might work, but I haven’t tried it yet.)

interesting. This is my first Genmai cha. My first impression was good, but since it’s like nothing I’ve tasted, I will have to drink a few more cups to acquire a real taste for it. It’s still a strange substance, somewhere between rice cakes and green tea, but definitely likable.