Welcome to my Japanese Tea Page
As I said on my previous tea page we enjoy green tea with brown rice or genmaicha. My husband grew up drinking this and during our years in Japan I came to enjoy it also. One of our favorite things to do is share a pot of tea with his parents after dinner. The tea flows and so do the stories. We regal one another...oh hogwash! We sit and talk story and laugh and talk story and laugh even harder!
For those of you not from Hawaii "Talk Story" is simply sitting and sharing what happened through the day and to swap stories of the latest news and gossip or ihea'a (That means "I hear" as in "I hear so and so did such and such!")
I recently read that GENMAICHA is "an informal drink in Japan shared at home with friends. This tea has a light golden color and a delicate toasted nut flavor and aroma." Sounds just right to me!
Now there are resources to investigate formal Japanese tea ceremony but I just want to share what and how we do informal tea in our home. It might just encourage you to try it for yourself. It makes a nice change to european type teas and is a fun and interesting way to introduce another culture into your homeschooling.
A typical time for tea for us is following dinner but before any dessert. Boiling water is placed into a thermos type teapot, and loose tea leaves are added to a small strainer that attaches to the lid. This goes down and sits it the water. I've found that too much tea and it gets bitter. I only let it steep until it is a nice golden color and then I remove the tea as this makes it bitter also. By the way this type of tea seems to get stronger as it sits. We serve it in small handle-less cups. I have a collection of "O-cha" cups and some "sushi" cups that are a bit larger. Mine come in sets of 2 and one is slightly larger than the other. It's not a mistake! The larger cup is for the gentleman and the smaller (in diameter and height) is for the lady. We were given sets for wedding gifts and I really enjoy them. For the children I try to find sets that are inexpensive at yard sales, etc. Once the teapot gets lost or broken most people don't want to keep the cups. Another man's trash is MY treasure! We did find some Disney character cups in Tokyo Disneyland. Our youngest likes those still.
If we serve any dessert with our tea it usually is something light such as a cookie. We are often the lucky recipient of delicate and fancy Japanese cookies. They wrap each one separately and package them in some of the prettiest tins and boxes. My husband prefers a plain shortbread type cookie with his tea. Sometimes we have fruit or just go without anything but tea.
When we traveled through Japan one thing we noticed and enjoyed was each room (in hotels) had a small pot to boil water and another to prepare and serve the tea in. In ryokans (inns) you mainly are given tea right after your meal. In Japan it is also served at almost every restaurant following your meal. In Japanese restaurants on the mainland U.S. you might have to request it.
We now travel with our tea things. It is as normal for us to take those things as it is to pack our toothbrushes. We even take it along while camping. Tea gives a nice continuity to our lives and I am careful to have what we need accessible when we PCS (move).
All graphics are from genweb except geishas which are from nekochan's.