Matcha Madness, A Guide To Green
Updated: Sep 16
The Healthy Caffeinated Drink That Took Over The World
& What You Need to Know About Matcha
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Tea is already the most consumed beverage in the world. It crosses borders, cultural divides, & age generations. Enjoy it Hot or Iced, Strong or Weak, Sweet or Bitter. Take tea alone to forget the world or sip tea with those you love the most. Matcha is the delicious and grassy drink that has made its mark on the beverage industry forever- It's the green bees knees... The best morning drink since coffee... & People all across the world have discovered how great Matcha is!
This Ultimate Green Guide is everything you will ever need to know about what matcha is.
Everyone will have their own entry into the world of tea, Welcome to the world's biggest club: Tea Drinkers!
As a tea freak, I know just how hard it is to find accurate & helpful information about matcha along with the stress of costly mistakes people make that can be avoided. MuChaCha's Matcha seeks to provide a wider spectrum of connoisseurship in the tea realm. In this article you'll get the main points on what's the deal with the green drink. The practical nature of matcha is simple because it's created in an easy to use manner- it's a powder!
Matcha ~ The Art
Actually originating in China, - Chinese Buddhist monks first enjoyed it as a form of medicine! The Japanese Monks that studied alongside the Chinese Monks then brought it back to Japan where the Japanese created the lifestyle and art of Matcha that we know today. The Japanese Samurai also really enjoyed matcha as they felt it brought tranquility to their violent lives. It was even drank just before the Samurai entered battle.
Characterized by high caffeine, a rich aroma, & an electric green color. While Japanese Matcha Powder and traditional green tea are made from the same plant, the major differences come in their preparation. First & foremost, matcha is green tea made by grinding shade-grown tea leaves into an ultra fine powder. Green tea is made by steeping the loose tea leaves in hot water for a few minutes, removing the tea infuser, & then drinking the tea like this. Matcha, however, comes in a powder form that is whisked with hot water. Matcha has a strong taste compared to traditional loose leaf green tea’s much milder taste.
When you try matcha for the first time, the flavor may catch you by surprise, but you will quickly learn to love it as you experiment to find your favorite matcha style. Matcha's flavor is described as Umami, it has a subtle sweet undertone underneath oceanic fresh grassy notes. Some folks describe it as grassy as wheat grass juice but I think matcha is less sour than that & closer to seaweed... but my favorite thing to say is that it tastes healthy!
In order to have the best quality Matcha, it must be well cared for during the growing process. Shade grown under shade cloths for several weeks before it's harvested.
What does that do: most plants get their energy and nutrients from the sun, so, by blocking the sunlight- it forces the tea plant to get its nutrients from the ground. During the shaded growth, the tea plant: Camellia Sinensis, produces more L-Theanine & Caffeine, the soil fills the leaves with vitamins & nutrients! Which~ no other tea we drink gets that special shady treatment.
After it's shade treatment, the leaves are picked- While fresh they are deveined/destemmed- & then flash steamed. 99% of the time you really should be looking for a Japanese grown matcha, though the craft of tea farming has really developed into a beautiful thing over the last 20 years so you can sometimes find an amazing quality tea in an unexpected foreign location to the original growing terroir. Tea has growing terroirs, a familiar term folks know from wine.
Simply put, terroir is the taste of a location in time: It includes every part of a growing region: the climate, the soil, & the interplay between them. Different places will grow the same thing & it will taste completely different because of the terroir variant.
Matcha requires a specific style of tea leaf called Tencha (Ten Cha - Ten means mortar or grind, Cha means tea ). The leaf is de-stemmed and de-veined, so the only part that gets ground up is the soft fleshy part of the tea leaf. Drinking loose leaf Tencha is actually prohibited in the original Japanese Tea Ceremony guide. So you won't really see people steeping the Tencha style leaf before it is ground up to become matcha- but it is possible & I have seen it offered on the dark corners of the interweb.
Good Matcha is Stone Milled using a granite stone called Blue Stone- it is a low friction stone, the stone is perfect to stay cool during the long period of time it takes to grind the matcha powder. It takes roughly 1 hour to mill 30 grams of matcha powder. Many other style mills unfortunately will become too hot and can begin to cook the leaves during the milling phase. Reducing the Matcha powder's health benefits right off the bat, this is why the Blue Stone is an important step in keeping the powder cool. If one of the reasons you're drinking matcha is for the health benefits, then it's important to stick with a Japanese Shade Grown Blue Stone Milled Matcha. Blue Stones have been the preferred method of milling matcha for over 800 years now.
For maximum freshness- matcha should be used within 8 weeks of opening, definitely in an airtight container, & ideally stored in the freezer. No matter how rare the matcha is, it's always best to drink it fresh. Matcha can not retain its freshness as long as a whole leaf tea because tea in powder form begins to oxidize rapidly. Oxidized matcha will have a distinctive hay-like smell & a dull brownish-green color. - There is no better time than now to drink it once it’s been opened!
Let's go with all that caffeine! Matcha contains 35 mg caffeine per 1/2 tsp. When I make myself an iced matcha at home it will have roughly 100 mg caffeine because it's a tall 20 oz sized glass with 1 1/2 tsp of matcha powder in it. Folks really enjoy the alertness they get from matcha due to the L-Theanine which provides a sense of relaxed happiness. The L-Theanine boosts levels of GABA, as well as serotonin & dopamine, while the caffeine perks your system.
Matcha's flavor can best be described as Umami, which is a mouth-filling subtle sweet undertone & strong oceanic grassy notes. The L-Theanine, Succinic Acid, Gallic acid, & Theogallin are the naturally occurring chemical factors contributing to the Umami flavor experience. With better quality matcha, the smoother & softer the umami will be.
That's your guide to all things green about matcha, we covered some solid FYI's & FAQ's ~ hopefully all the info you need to get started on your own! If you'd like some additional reading, we've got blogs on the best of the matcha world, or find answers to your question by searching the Matcha Talk Forum.
With Good Matcha, It's Easy Being Green!
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