What is gyokuro green tea?
Gyokuro is a premium quality fine green tea from Japan. Unlike the most popular and widely consumed Japanese green tea, sencha, gyokuro is not grown in direct sunlight, but is instead protected under shade for at least two weeks before harvesting. It's actually categorized as a sencha variety because of similar production methods, but it is distinctly different, owing to the effect of being shielded from the sun. When this happens, the caffeine levels and the amino acids (theanine, if you want the official name!) in the leaves rise sharply, while at the same time the catechin content of the plant will decrease. Since catechin is the main source of astringency or bitterness in green tea, the flavor of the tea becomes much more sweet than that of regular sencha green tea.
This process is also used in the making of tencha, which is ground down to produce matcha – the famous green powdered tea used in Japanese tea ceremonies. The difference, however, is that for tencha, the leaves are laid out flat to dry, resulting in them crumbling slightly (ideal for grinding into matcha powder). For gyokuro, the leaves are rolled out before drying.
Gyokuro translates as “jewel dew” or “jade jewel”, and as you might guess from that, it's quite an expensive tea. However, the name actually refers to the pale green color of the infusion! It's a very high grade tea, often produced using the leaves of a specialized variety tea plant like Yamakai, Okumidori, Saemidoru, or Asahi – again, setting it apart from regular sencha.
Most drinkers of Japanese green tea will know that it requires you to pay especially careful attention to detail in terms of brewing. Tea leaves should normally be steeped for no longer than 3 minutes, as any longer brings out bitterness in the flavor of the infusion. In addition to this, no more than one teaspoon of leaves should be used per cup, and the water should be no higher than about 80°C – all for the same reason, as these are factors that can bring out the astringency in the tea.
However, sellers of gyokuro recommend a slightly different set of rules for brewing this tea. Firstly, the leaves should be steeped for longer than the one minute minimum of regular sencha – 90 seconds at the very least is advised. Secondly, twice the amount of tea leaves should be used: so two or three teaspoons per cup, rather than just one. And thirdly, the water needs to be cooler, around 50-60°C. Note that this is quite a bit cooler, so you might want to pre-heat both the cup and the teapot in order to keep the tea warm for long enough for you to drink it! An important point to remember, since gyokuro is traditionally sipped very slowly, in order to savor and linger over its distinctive flavors. A good way to cool the water and warm the cups and pot at the same time is to boil water in the kettle, leave it for a few minutes to cool slightly, and then pour into your teapot. Allow it to sit for a little while, thus warming the pot. Then pour the water from the teapot into the cups to be used, and throw away any extra water. Once the cups, too, have warmed up, put your tea leaves into the pot and pour the water from the cups back into the pot – by this stage, all the transferring should have cooled the water down, but use a thermometer if you're not sure. It really does make a difference!
Useful Links:
http://www.o-cha.com/brewing-gyokuro.htm
http://www.thefragrantleaf.com/gymaofjafigr.html
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