Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Aiya
Tea Description:
Premium Gyokuro (meaning “Jade Dew”) is the pinnacle of Japanese loose leaf green tea. Similar to Matcha, the leaves are handpicked and shade grown to preserve its amino acids bringing out its natural sweet taste. Best served steeped in a lower temperature to maximize taste.
Learn more about this tea here.
Taster’s Review:
What a wonderful Gyokuro – one of the best I’ve sampled in a long time!
The flavor is so sweet yet crisp and light. The taste really does evoke thoughts of what the flavor of a fresh dew drop on a young blade of grass might taste like. It has a delicateness to it that is very spring-like to me … like the fresh, young growth of a sprig of grass or the budding leaf on a tree in spring.
The aroma of the dry leaf is grassy, and after brewing the tea maintains that grassy fragrance, although it is quite a bit softer. This translates into the flavor. It tastes lightly grassy, but, not in an off-putting way. More like the fresh, exhilarating flavor of sweet grass. A hint of buttery tones in the background – just a hint, nothing too heavy or overwhelming – just a kiss of creamy sweetness to enhance the overall cup.
There is no bitterness to this cup, just pure, sweet green tea goodness – just what you’d expect from a Premium Gyokuro, and the high quality I’ve come to expect from Aiya.
Premium Gyokuro Suimei from Den’s Tea
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Den’s Tea
Product Description:
Our highest quality tea. This is made from only the youngest top part of tea leaves picked by hand and carefully processed into an ultra fine needle. Its super natural sweetness promotes a mellow state of mind.
Taster’s Review:
What a lovely Gyokuro! So full of flavor!
It is INCREDIBLY sweet. Den’s Tea website suggests a seaweed-like flavor, but I don’t taste seaweed… at least, this is like no seaweed that I’ve tasted. I’m not particularly fond of seaweed, it is far too briny and strong for my taste, and I don’t get that funky seaweed taste from this cup … thankfully!
I do taste a background of vegetal flavor that is neither what I would call grassy or similar to steamed vegetables… it is a rather mild flavor that reminds me a bit of the resulting broth after boiling kale. Perhaps this is where they get the seaweed analogy. Either way, this flavor is light, and certainly nothing that disrupts the amazing sweetness that I’m experiencing from this tea.
The tea is thick, it feels like a warm broth as it glides over the palate. It is very soft and pleasant to sip.
I highly recommend this Gyokuro: it is definitely one of the best available.
ITFA Global Tea Taster’s Club, August Shipment, Part 4: Old Style Gyokuro (First Flush)
Leaf Type: Green
Produced by Kurihara Seicha
For More Information, visit the Tea Farms webpage
About ITFA Global Tea Tasters Club:
By subscribing to the Global Tea Tasters Club, you will receive tea from ITFA tea farms 6 times per year. Each time, we will select a different region to feature and as we grow in tea farm members, so will your tea experience.
Your tea will also be accompanied by info about the tea and the tea farms themselves.
To know where your tea is coming from, who has grown and produced it, to taste the difference in teas from around the world…what could be better?
Taster’s Review:
I’ve not tried a lot of Gyokuro, but, of those that I’ve tried, this is easily the BEST. It is ah-MAAAZ-ing!
It is incredibly sweet, but not a cloying, sugary sweet. It is more of a vegetal sweetness, like the naturally occurring sweetness you might taste in a vegetable. There are hints of grassiness to this, but not a bitter grassy taste. If I could only use one word to summarize the flavor of this tea, the word would be sweet.
But, one word does not make a review, does it? 
The texture of this Gyokuro is thick and broth-y, or as the literature provided with the Global Tea Taster’s Club package suggests: syrupy. It is incredibly smooth and rich in flavor. While the overall flavor can be described as sweet, there are some intriguing savory notes to the tea. It tastes very fresh (and it should, as it was harvested in May of this year).
The price of the subscription to the Global Tea Taster’s Club is worth it for this tea alone! Yes. It is THAT good.
Gyokuro (Tea Bags) from Maeda-en
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Maeda-en
Product Description:
Craving a good cup of gyokuro, but not in the mood to deal with the mess? We have just the solution for you!
Maeda-en is proud to offer you deliciousness and convenience all at the same time: crushed blue-green Gyokuro leaves are packed in mesh pyramid bags for maximum steeping & easy clean up. It brews the beautiful jade liquor Gyokuro is known for, and tastes just like a whole leaf brew!
Taster’s Review:
A bagged Gyokuro? Yes, I had my doubts, which may just be why it took me so long to actually try this tea. I received one of these pyramid sachets as a free sample with my order last year. I stashed the foil package into one of my many tea caddies and forgot about it until last night while rummaging through my stash. I decided it was time to give it a try.
And even though I’ve had this for a year, the flavor is still intact. And it is VERY good. Yes, even though it’s bagged. It has a mouth-watering, brothy vegetative taste that is sweet and clean. And to tell you the truth, had I not brewed this myself, I don’t know that I would be able to tell the difference between this and a loose leaf Gyokuro.
I’m very impressed.
Gyokuro Imperial from Georgia Tea Company
Tea Information:
Leaf Type: Green
Where to Buy: Georgia Tea Company
Product Description:
Gyokuro, whose name means “jade dew” is Japan’s finest and often costliest tea. It is not uncommon for a pound of the rarest Gyokuro to sell for thousands of dollars. What makes this variety unique? While the young leaves of the spring flush develop, the tea bushes are shaded from sun for three weeks. The sun-deprived tea that grows in the shade is high in chlorophyll, which makes it darker than normal, but lower in tannins, which makes it sweeter and mild tasting.
Taster’s Review:
I really like Gyokuro teas, but, I don’t enjoy them often because they can be on the pricy side. But I consider it an investment in good taste – an investment I am not able to afford to make often, but I enjoy every drop of it when I can!
The dry leaf has a strong vegetative fragrance and while it does soften a bit after steeping, the brewed tea is still smells quite grassy. I am glad that the taste isn’t “grassy” – it has more of a fresh, steamed vegetable taste than that of grass. It also has a pleasing nutty flavor to it. There is no bitterness to it. There is some dry astringency to it, but it is slight.
It is a very soothing tea to sip, one that I find to be perfect for the early evening when I’m ready to unwind. It’s a lovely way to end the day!