Review: Kaori Kamacha Yamasemi (Fujimidori) 2019

Details

Name: Kaori Kamacha Yamasemi (Fujimidori) 2019

Seller: Suzuki Tea Farm

Type: Oolong

Origin: Kawane, Shizuoka, Japan

Plantation: Suzuki Tea Farm

Season: Early summer

Year: 2019

Cultivar: Fujimidori

Processing: Withering for 16 hours, pan frying

5g steeped in a gaiwan for 15 seconds at 203°F/95°C

Tasting Notes

Top: Spinach

Middle: Orchid

Last: Grape leaves

Tea Leaves

After putting the leaves in a warm gaiwan and waiting a bit, I check the smell. I sense aromas of spinach, forest, hojicha, and something verdant and sweet like an orchid.

I take a look at the leaves after the fourth steep. There have unfurled so much that they fill the gaiwan. The leaves are a deep green, tinged here and there with reddish-brown. They are about 4-5cm in size, comparatively large. Though extremely thin, they are properly fibrous. The leaves haven’t been cut, and are the same size as when they were plucked one by one, but some torn and shredded leaves are visible.

Impressions

A vegetable-like aroma, reminiscent of spinach, gives the impression of dark green like a summer forest. And, perhaps from the pan frying process, there is also a sweet, fragrant, sugar-like sensation, like in hojicha. With the tea in my mouth, I feel a strong sweetness on my tongue, and sense a delicious, gentle, orchid-like floral fragrance. After swallowing, a gradual astringency and bitterness, which is felt after drinking Japanese ryokucha, lingers on my tongue. The astringency comes out enough to be clearly felt even from a 15-second steep, but it’s not unpleasant. Instead, I think it brings a more sharp and refreshing quality to the bright green aroma.

In the second steeping, the sugar-like sweet and fragrant aroma calms down, and the verdant, floral aroma becomes dominant. In the aftertaste, I can sense the gradually lingering astringency of Japanese teas.

For the third steep, the aroma imparted by the roasting subsides considerably. With each steep, the taste on my tongue changes more into an impression like Japanese tea.

If I were to give an example, it may be like a Wenshan Baozhong made from a Japanese cultivar. The explanation from the tea farm says it undergoes a light withering and pan frying process, so perhaps the similarities of the bright green fragrance, gentle floral aroma, and invigorating astringency are due partly to the processing technique. Regarding the vegetal, green flavor, prominent astringency, and umami and astringency felt on the tongue after swallowing, I feel they are characteristic components of this tea. Especially from the 3rd steep onward, as the aromatic, sweet flavor thought to come from the roasting decreases, the vegetal and floral notes become the main aromas. At the same time, I felt that the refreshingly astringent, grape leaf and muscat peel flavor became closer to the traditional Japanese sencha flavor. The history of this cultivar, called Fujimidori, is largely unknown. Compared to common cultivars like "yabukita," I feel that it has a characteristic the bright green aroma, and strong sweetness and astringency. I think that its particularly unique characteristic is the biting astringency on the tongue.

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