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.
Also called Japanese teapot brewing, senchado style.
How it works
Around 2 g of leaf per 100 ml goes into a side-handled pot with a wide integral filter. The first infusion runs 45 to 90 seconds at 70 to 80 °C, depending on the tea. The pot is then emptied completely — leaving liquor behind is the mistake that ruins the second cup — and the second infusion is markedly shorter, often 15 to 30 seconds, because the leaf is already open. The third goes longer again and slightly hotter.
Why choose it
It is the method Japanese green tea is made for, and it produces a sequence of different cups rather than one averaged one without any of gongfu’s equipment or ceremony.
Equipment
- Kyusu — Glazed or unglazed ceramic; Tokoname and Banko clays are traditional
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.
Common problems
- Water too hot, which is the single most common fault with Japanese green tea
- Not emptying the pot completely, so the second infusion begins over-extracted
- Making the second infusion as long as the first, which produces a bitter cup
- Using a basket infuser, which clogs on deep-steamed leaf and under-extracts
Diagnosed problems
Written from the symptom, with the likely causes in order and a question to rule each one out.
- My green tea tastes flat and looks dark in this house — A delicate green tea that tasted bright elsewhere comes out dull and heavy here, with a darker, browner liquor than it should have and none of its aroma.
- 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 Japanese green tea comes out cloudy — The liquor is opaque and deep green rather than clear, with fine particles suspended through it and a layer settling in the bottom of the cup.
- My Japanese green tea tastes of seaweed or fish — A sencha, gyokuro or matcha reads as marine — seaweed at best, distinctly fishy at worst — and it is not clear whether that is the tea or a fault.
- My second infusion is much worse than the first — The first steep is good and the second is bitter, flat or both.
- My water is not the temperature the kettle says — The kettle is set to 80 °C and the tea behaves as though it were much hotter or much cooler, and the same setting gives different results on different days.
- The leaf clogs my strainer and the pour stops — Liquid backs up behind the strainer or the pot’s built-in filter, and the last of the tea will not come through.
- There is sediment in the bottom of my cup — A layer of fine dark particles settles out, and the last mouthful is gritty.
Teas with parameters authored for this method
27 teas have a parameter set written for kyusu brewing (japanese style), in alphabetical order. Each row is transcribed from that tea’s own record.
| Tea | Leaf (g/100 ml) | Water (°C) | Authored infusions | First infusion (s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aracha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Asamushi sencha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Bancha | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Chumushi sencha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Fukamushicha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Genmaicha | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Guricha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Gyokuro | 3–5 | 50–60 | 3 | 150 |
| Hojicha | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Kabusecha | 3–5 | 50–60 | 3 | 150 |
| Kagoshima sencha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Kamairicha | 3–4.5 | 78–88 | 3 | 90 |
| Karigane | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Konacha | 2–3.5 | 75–85 | 2 | 20 |
| Kuki hojicha | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Kukicha | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Matcha-iri genmaicha | 3–5 | 80–90 | 3 | 45 |
| Mecha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Mizudashi sencha | 3.5–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 75 |
| Sayama sencha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Sencha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Shincha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Shizuoka sencha | 2.5–4 | 70–80 | 3 | 60 |
| Tamaryokucha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Tencha | 2.5–4 | 65–75 | 3 | 120 |
| Uji sencha | 3–5 | 65–75 | 3 | 60 |
| Yame gyokuro | 3–5 | 50–60 | 3 | 150 |
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.
- Low-temperature brewing (gyokuro style) — A great deal of shaded Japanese leaf in a very small volume of water that is deliberately far below boiling — cool enough that the vessel can be held bare-handed. It is the most extreme low-temperature steeping in common practice, and it exists to extract one part of the leaf while leaving another behind.
- 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
This page is TeaHQ synthesis. No external source stands behind the description of this method. It is written from common practice as TeaHQ understands it, and the parameters in the table above come from each tea’s own record rather than from this page.
The numbers for this method are held per tea, never on the method itself. Where a tea has no set written for kyusu brewing (japanese style), TeaHQ shows nothing rather than converting its numbers from another style — a scaled ratio and a halved time read as an answer while being one nobody authored.
Written comparisons
Where TeaHQ has set this method against something it is routinely confused with, and argued the differences out in full.
- Does water temperature matter? — More than any other variable except leaf quantity, and the reason is chemical rather than a matter of taste. It is the first equipment upgrade that changes the tea rather than the convenience.
- Korean green tea brewing vs Japanese kyusu brewing — Two low-temperature approaches to green tea from neighbouring countries, differing in how the water is cooled and in what the leaf underneath them is. Korean practice cools water through a separate open vessel before it ever meets the leaf; Japanese practice cools it by pouring between cups and pot.
- Kyusu brewing vs gongfu brewing — The two multi-infusion traditions in everyday use, and they are far closer to each other than either is to western brewing. Both use more leaf and less time than a teapot, both pour off completely, and both shorten the second steep — which surprises people who have only met one of them.
- Kyusu vs western brewing — Japanese green tea brewed the Japanese way and the western way are not the same drink. The kyusu is closer to gongfu practice than to a teapot, which is why sencha tastes thin from a mug.
- Low-temperature gyokuro brewing vs ordinary kyusu brewing — Both are Japanese, both use a small pot, and the parameters have almost nothing in common. Gyokuro brewing uses a great deal of leaf in a very small volume of water at a temperature at which most drinkers would assume nothing would extract.
- Whisking matcha vs steeping sencha — Both are Japanese green tea and the two preparations have almost nothing in common mechanically. One suspends the whole leaf in water and serves it; the other extracts from leaf and throws the leaf away. Everything else — grade sensitivity, cost, how a mistake shows — follows from that single difference.