Glossary
Japanese tea glossary
Plain-language definitions of the words on a Japanese tea label — cultivars, shading, harvests, milling and the teaware around them. Terms with a full explainer link onward.
GLOSSARY
Tea types
- Sencha（煎茶）
- Japan's everyday steamed green tea, grown in open sun. Brighter and brisker than shaded teas; the baseline most other Japanese greens are understood against. Learn more →
- Matcha（抹茶）
- Shade-grown tea leaves (tencha) stone-milled into a fine powder and whisked into water — you drink the leaf itself rather than an infusion. Learn more →
- Gyokuro（玉露）
- A shaded leaf tea: covered for weeks before harvest, then brewed cool and slow. Known for deep sweetness and umami rather than briskness. Learn more →
- Hojicha（ほうじ茶・houjicha）
- Green tea roasted until toasty and brown. Roasting trades grassy notes for warmth and aroma; brewed hot and briefly. Learn more →
- Genmaicha（玄米茶）
- Green tea blended with roasted rice. The rice adds a nutty, popcorn-like aroma; like hojicha, it likes hot water and a short steep. Learn more →
- Kamairicha（釜炒り茶）
- A pan-fired (rather than steamed) Japanese green tea, historically from Kyushu — a rounder, less grassy profile than steamed styles. Learn more →
- Wakoucha（和紅茶）
- Japanese-grown black tea. A small but growing category, often from the same cultivars and farms as green tea. Learn more →
- Tencha（碾茶）
- The shaded, flattened leaf that matcha is milled from. Rarely drunk as-is; its quality decides the matcha's. Learn more →
Growing & harvest
- First flush（shincha・新茶・ichibancha）
- The first harvest of the year, moving across Japan through spring. Prized for fresh aroma; 'shincha' is this new tea sold soon after picking. Learn more →
- Cultivar（品種）
- A named, propagated tea-plant variety — Yabukita, Okumidori, Samidori, Gokou and many more. Cultivar shapes flavour the way a grape variety shapes wine. Learn more →
- Yabukita（やぶきた）
- Japan's most widely planted tea cultivar, the reference point for sencha character; most single-cultivar teas define themselves against it. Learn more →
- Shading（覆い下・covered culture）
- Covering tea plants before harvest to soften bitterness and deepen umami and colour. Gyokuro, tencha/matcha and kabusecha are all shaded styles.
- Kabusecha（かぶせ茶）
- A lightly/briefly shaded leaf tea — between sencha and gyokuro in character and price.
- Uji（宇治）
- A historic tea region around Kyoto, closely tied to matcha and gyokuro tradition. On a label, a region name is a verifiable fact — unlike a grade word. Learn more →
- Yame（八女）
- A tea region in Fukuoka, Kyushu, with a strong reputation for gyokuro. One of the region names worth learning to read on a label. Learn more →
- Okumidori（奥みどり）
- A tea cultivar bred from Yabukita, known for deep green colour and low bitterness. Often a blending component in matcha rather than a single-origin headline. Learn more →
Processing & grading
- Ceremonial grade
- A marketing term with no public, industry-wide definition — each vendor applies it on its own. Verifiable signals instead: region, cultivar, harvest, milling and price per gram. Learn more →
- Culinary grade
- A vendor term for matcha aimed at cooking and lattes rather than drinking straight. Like 'ceremonial', it has no public standard — read the verifiable specs. Learn more →
- Stone-milled（石臼挽き）
- Matcha ground slowly between granite mills, the traditional method associated with a fine particle and low-heat grinding. Makers usually state it when true.
- Deep-steamed（fukamushi・深蒸し）
- Sencha steamed longer at processing, giving a cloudier, richer cup and finer leaf particles. A style, not a quality grade.
- Umami（旨味）
- The savoury, brothy taste dimension central to shaded Japanese teas — what gyokuro and good matcha are prized for.
- Price per gram
- The honest way to compare teas across tin and bag sizes: the price of one gram. CHANOMA prints it beside the price where the vendor publishes one — we don't divide it out ourselves, because pack sizes are often approximate. Learn more →
Teaware & brewing
- Kyusu（急須）
- The Japanese side-handled teapot, usually with a built-in strainer — the standard tool for leaf teas like sencha and gyokuro. Learn more →
- Chasen（茶筅）
- The bamboo whisk used to suspend matcha in water and raise its foam. Carved from a single piece of bamboo; rinse and air-dry to keep the tines. Learn more →
- Chawan（茶碗）
- The tea bowl matcha is whisked and drunk from — wide enough for the whisk to work.
- Chashaku（茶杓）
- The slender bamboo scoop used to measure matcha powder.
- Yuzamashi（湯冷まし）
- A small vessel for cooling boiled water before brewing — handy for teas like gyokuro that prefer cooler water.
- Cold brew（mizudashi・水出し）
- Steeping tea leaves in cold water over hours instead of minutes — the summer style that trades briskness for sweetness (DESIGN's 水出しの夏). Learn more →
- Chabashira（茶柱）
- A tea stalk floating upright in the cup — a traditional sign of good luck. The /brew timer tips its hat to it, rarely.