Kimberley's Kyusu

I’m sure it comes as a shock to absolutely no-one that I am a huge Gyokuro fan, I have always said that if I could only drink one kind of loose leaf Japanese green tea for the rest of my life it would be Gyokuro, so I am always on the look out for new ones to try. Be it from a farm I have never tried before or a different cultivar, I will never turn down the opportunity to sip on a new (to me) Gyokuro.

Not too long ago now, I had the opportunity to try Kurihara Tea’s – #03 Shin (Heart) Premium Gyokuro and I thoroughly enjoyed the session, so I thought I’d share my notes with all of you. This particular Gyokuro is shaded for three weeks, machine cut and given a medium steaming. However, due to the leaves being young and delicate, the result of that steaming is much closer to a deep steamed Fukamushi tea.

The dry leaves are mixed shades of green, from dark bottle green to bright spring grass green. They are glossy, thin and needle like in shape, similar to how pine needles look. The aroma of the dry leaves is quite sweet with notes of freshly made shortbread, hay, butter, grassy vegetal, honey and butter crisps. 

For my first session with this tea I used: 5.5g of tea, my 100ml houhin and freshly filtered water at 65C. The first steep was 90 seconds, the second steep was 10 seconds and the third was 15 seconds. Upon the addition of water, the aroma changes substantially and now has notes of seaweed, fridge fresh spinach, fresh edamame with sea salt, sweet vegetable notes, hay, green apple, broth, savoury, fresh cut wet grass and freshly made Udon noodles. 

The colour of the liquor changed quite drastically between the two steeps with the first steep being a vibrant yellowy green and the second steep being a much darker green in colour and a lot more cloudy, as if the leaves had been steeped with matcha. 

During the first steep, the flavour profile was primarily made up of notes of pine and vegetal notes, which tasted like a mixture of dried seaweed, wilted spinach with butter and fresh edamame. There’s also a slight sweetness, which I was expecting to be a little more prominent given how sweet the dry leaves smelt.

The second steep became a little brighter and had a hint of citrus present. It was just broth in taste, with all of those vegetal notes mentioned in the notes from the first steep as well as the addition of dandelion leaf and a slightly cooling minty freshness.

Steep three is where this tea really started to mellow out and I think that it’s because I used too little leaves for the pot I was preparing this in. All of its best elements from the previous steeps were still present but they started to become much lighter. Looking back at this session I should have stopped it here, but I did a fourth steep and made the steeping time longer just to see how it would change things.

Steep four was super mellow sadly and as a result I would recommend that 3 steeps is all you do with this tea if you are going to use the parameters I did during this session. Yes, we all want to get the most out of our leaves but those super mellow steeps are never worth it. The fourth steep was mellow but sweetener than the rest because all of the brothy greenness had mellowed out and had it had a juicy green apple taste to it as it cooled in the cup.

In terms of textures this tea is smooth, thick, creamy and juicy. There is some astringency present but it doesn’t detract from the tea at all, nor does it hinder my overall enjoyment. The second steep had a touch more astringency than the first, which weirdly appeared right on the tip of my tongue each time I took a sip. It is a little drying in the mouth but its only really noticeable on the sides of my tongue after the tea has ben swallowed.

This tea has a long lasting finish with notes of wilted spinach and juicy green apples. The second steep didn’t linger for as long as the first did but was still pretty long lasting and had the same overall notes. As the steeps went on, the finish was shorter and those notes got lighter, but that was only to be expected.

The wet leaves at the end of the sessions I have had with this tea were various shades of green ranging from dark forest green to light bright yellowy green, just like the dry leaves, only they had become bigger in size. The aroma of the empty cup is all light grassy notes alongside notes of whipped cream, which instantly made me want a pastry filled with matcha cream. I have done a handful of sessions with this tea and at the end of each one I have felt chilled out but also energized and inspired, which is just how I like to feel when I have a busy day ahead.

If you want to try this tea yourself and compare my tasting notes to your own, you can find it over on the Yunomi website. You can use my code INFKKYU to get 1000yen off of an order of 5000yen or more. As always if you have any questions or tea recommendations, be sure to leave them in the comments on this post.

Until next time, Happy Steeping – Kimberley