Nakamura-en #02: Gyokuro Konacha, The Discovery 玉露粉茶 Nakamura-en

A delicious discovery, an easy introduction to the world of gyokuro tea. Besides the amazingly savory umami flavor characteristic of gyokuro, ‘The Discovery’ is also extremely versatile releasing savory umami flavor at a much wider range of flavors than gyokuro tea itself.

Konacha itself is made up of the smallest, broken bits of tea leaves (not quite powder) left over after processing. Because of the small size, it steeps very quickly.

Product Info

• Ingredients: Green tea
• Harvest: Spring
• Notes: Shaded for about 3 weeks before harvest for the extra umami flavor for which gyokuro is known. After processing into dry leaf, the fannings of the leaves (small broken leaf bits) are separated out to form this tea.
• Region: Kyoto

THE STORY OF THE DISCOVERY

We actually went out of our way to find this tea after Sencha Tea Ceremony master Yukiko Hasue introduced us. Finding the century old Nakamura-en Tea Shop on the eastern side of Tokyo near the Sumo Wrestling Arena (Ryogoku station), tea merchant Nakamura-san taught us more about gyokuro leaf fannings to share with the world.

Nakamura-san does speak a bit of conversational English, so if you are ever in Tokyo do visit his shop!! He has no website though, so simply follow this simple map (GOOGLE MAP).