Visit Gyokuro tea fields in the Asahina district, Shizuoka

Gyokuro is the highest quality of green tea, the king of green tea. Making Gyokuro is difficult and hard, also it is hard to keep the quality itself. There are three major regions known as gyokuro-producing in Japan, Uji in Kyoto, Yame in Fukuoka, and Asahina in Shizuoka. We visited this Asahina district and learn about Gyokuro and taste it.

Even Japanese people drink gyokuro occasionally since it’s not the kind of green tea that you drink with a meal. You drink it when guests come to your house and when you want to be relaxed after the meal or between the meal. It’s not necessary to be like those occasions, but I just want to say it’s a special kind of tea for Japanese. If you look at the kanji character for gyokuro, you’ll see that ‘Gyoku(Tama)’ means ‘ball(pearl)’ and ‘Ro(Tsuyu)’ means ‘dew’, its taste and aroma reminded people of “beautiful dewdrops like pearls”. There is a special way of tasting gyokuro.

We visited Gyokuro Terrace Asahina run by Noboru-san, one of the gyokuro master in Asahina district. It is located in the mountains next to the Asahina River, great place to produce tea. He has a wooden hut and terrace in his tea field. There he teaches visitors tea culture and how to grow and drink tea. We looked around tea field and drunk gyokuro the way he taught us to. You will be surprised when you taste gyokuro! It’s unlike any tea you’ve ever had before. Please look forward to the details when you visit.