Hojicha Quotes

When I stayed here, Tea-riffic kind of reminded me of being back at your parents’ shop. It’s a nice spot.” “Tea-riffic?” I echo. He grins. “It’s pretty tea-sty.” I groan, but then I let out a laugh. “Well, you had me at tea.” Tea-riffic Café turns out to be the perfect place to load up on caffeine. I go for a milky hojicha with brown sugar boba, and Jack chooses a winter melon green tea with bits of aloe.

The fanciest grade of green tea in Japan goes by the name of gyokuro, meaning "jade dew." It consists of the newest leaves of a tea plantation's oldest tea bushes that bud in May and have been carefully protected from the sun under a double canopy of black nylon mesh. The leaves are then either steeped in boiled water or ground into a powder to make matcha (literally, "grind tea"), the thick tea served at a tea ceremony. (The powder used to make the thin tea served at a tea ceremony comes from grinding the older leaves of young tea plants, resulting in a more bitter-tasting tea.) The middle grade of green tea is called sencha, or "brew tea," and is made from the unprotected young tea leaves that unfurl in May or June. The leaves are usually steeped in hot water to yield a fragrant grassy brew to enjoy on special occasions or in fancy restaurants. For everyday tea, the Japanese buy bancha. Often containing tiny tea twigs, it consists of the large, coarse, unprotected leaves that remain on the tea bush until August. When these leaves are roasted, they become a popular tea called hojicha. When hojicha combines with popped roasted brown rice, a tea called genmaicha results.

Here's the soup. Nothing new, but if you're going to have broth in summer, it has to be botan-hamo: lightly boiled hamo eel, named for the way it's cut into the shape of a peony to remove the bones. As for this ayu rice, the only ingredient is in the name. The fish are deboned, so all you need to do is sprinkle some of these chopped mitsuba leaves on top. The pickles on the side are eggplant and myoga ginger. Now, you tuck in, and I'll bring you a cup of hojicha.