Low-temperature brewing (gyokuro style)

How it works

Shading a tea bush before picking changes what is in the leaf: it is associated with more of the amino acids that read as savoury sweetness and with less of the material that turns harsh under heat. Water cool enough to leave that harsh fraction largely in the leaf will still take the amino acids out, because they dissolve readily at low temperature. The trade is volume and time — the liquor produced is a mouthful rather than a cup, and the first steep is unhurriedly long by Japanese standards. The pot is drained to the very last drop, and later steeps are made progressively hotter and shorter as the leaf gives up what is left. Vessels for this are handleless for a reason: at this temperature there is nothing to burn a hand on, and a broad shallow body cools the water further as it is poured in.

Why choose it

It is the preparation gyokuro and kabusecha are grown for, and nothing else shows what shading actually did to the leaf. A shaded tea brewed at ordinary green-tea temperature tastes like an expensive sencha; brewed this way it tastes like a different drink.

Equipment

• Houhin — Glazed or unglazed porcelain and stoneware; Tokoname and Banko clays are common
• Shiboridashi — Porcelain or stoneware, glazed or unglazed
• Kyusu — Glazed or unglazed ceramic; Tokoname and Banko clays are traditional
• Thermometer — Stainless steel probe with a digital display, or an infrared sensor

Tea types it suits

Recorded on the method rather than inferred from the catalogue. A type missing here is not ruled out; it simply has not been written down.

• Green tea

Common problems

• Using ordinary green-tea water temperature, which extracts the harsh fraction the method exists to leave behind
• Brewing a cup-sized volume, which dilutes the liquor to the point where the technique is pointless
• Not draining the vessel completely, so the leaf sits in warm water and the second steep starts already spent
• Applying the method to an unshaded tea, which has less of what the low temperature is selecting for

Diagnosed problems

Written from the symptom, with the likely causes in order and a question to rule each one out.

• My green tea tastes bitter — The cup is sharp and unpleasant, sometimes with a drying, mouth-puckering quality alongside the bitterness.
• My gyokuro tastes like an expensive sencha — A costly shaded tea gives a cup that is pleasant, green and unremarkable, with none of the thick sweetness and savoury depth it was bought for.
• My tea tastes flat and lifeless — The tea is not bitter or weak exactly, but has lost its aroma and tastes dull and papery.

Teas with parameters authored for this method

5 teas have a parameter set written for low-temperature brewing (gyokuro style), in alphabetical order. Each row is transcribed from that tea’s own record.

Other western methods

Same family, so the approach is close — the vessel, the ratio and the intent still differ.

• Herbal infusion (tisane) — Steeping leaves, flowers or fruit that are not Camellia sinensis. The method looks like tea brewing and follows different rules, because the material has none of the compounds that make tea sensitive to heat and time.
• Korean green tea brewing — A low-temperature approach to Korean green tea in which the water is cooled through a separate open vessel before it ever meets the leaf, and the pot is emptied entirely into the cups each time. Darye names the etiquette; the brewing approach below is shared by everyday practice outside any formal setting.
• Kyusu brewing (Japanese style) — The Japanese domestic approach to green tea: a moderate quantity of leaf, water well off the boil, short steeps, and two or three infusions from the same leaf with the times adjusted each time.
• Mug infuser brewing — Loose leaf in a basket inside a mug — the most common way loose tea is actually made, and the method most often responsible for people concluding that loose leaf is not worth the trouble.
• Sweet tea (American Southern style) — Black tea brewed hot and strong as a concentrate, sweetened while it is still hot, then diluted with cold water and chilled. It is a regional American household staple, and the sequence of those four steps is the whole method — rearranging them produces a different and worse drink.
• Tea bag brewing — Pre-portioned tea in a permeable bag. The format was an accident of early twentieth-century sampling practice and became the dominant way tea is drunk worldwide, because it removes every decision except how long to leave it in.
• Western brewing (teapot or mug) — A small amount of leaf in a large volume of water, steeped once for a few minutes and then strained off. The approach most English-speaking drinkers already know, and the one most teas sold in the West are made for.

Sources