Bowl of frothy whisked matcha with a bamboo whisk and matcha powder

Matcha Guide: From Shaded Leaf to Whisked Bowl

Published 12 Oct 20269 min read

Filed under Tea Fellow Mariage Frères Japan

Matcha is green tea that is drunk whole. Leaf tea is steeped: hot water pulls flavor out of the leaves, and the leaves are thrown away. Matcha is the leaf itself, ground into a fine powder and whisked into water, so the ground leaf ends up in the bowl. Three steps make it what it is: the tea bushes are grown in shade, the picked leaf is dried flat into a tea called tencha, and the tencha is ground on a stone mill. This guide follows those steps, explains what the words ceremonial and culinary on a label do and do not mean, and covers whisking, water temperature and storage. The green tea guide covers the wider family, from sencha to hojicha.

What makes tea matcha

Picked tea leaves start to change almost at once. Ito En, a Japanese tea company, explains that enzymes in the raw leaf begin oxidizing it (a chemical reaction with oxygen) as soon as it is picked, and that green tea is made by steaming and roasting the fresh leaf to halt that reaction. Matcha starts the same way and then goes down its own path.

On April 11, 2022, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), the international body that publishes agreed definitions for products and methods, published a technical report on matcha, numbered ISO/TR 21380:2022. Japan's National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (NARO), a government research agency, played a leading role in preparing it. NARO describes matcha this way: matcha uses the new shoots of tea grown under shade as its raw material, and it needs special tea-making machinery to produce its bright green color, rich taste and aroma.

Grown in shade

A few weeks before picking, the bushes that will become matcha are covered. Ito En describes the bushes for gyokuro, a shaded leaf tea, being covered with cloth or reed screens for about 20 days before picking, and says the covering period for tencha, the leaf that becomes matcha, is longer than that.

The shade changes the chemistry of the leaf. Tea leaves contain theanine, an amino acid (one of the building blocks of protein), and catechins, compounds tied to astringency, the dry, puckering feeling some teas leave in the mouth. The plant makes catechins from theanine. Ito En explains that covering the bushes suppresses that conversion, which lowers astringency and gives a richer flavor. Ippodo, a Kyoto tea house, describes matcha as made from tea leaves "packed with umami flavor." Umami is the savory taste of a good broth.

From leaf to tencha

After picking, the leaf is steamed like other Japanese green teas. Then it parts ways with them. Sencha, which Ito En calls the most frequently drunk and well-known green tea, is rolled after steaming. Tencha is not rolled at all. Ito En says the steamed leaves are dried without being rolled, and the stalks and leaf veins are then removed. What is left are small, flat flecks of dried leaf. That is tencha, and it is the leaf that becomes matcha.

That trimming happens before grinding, and nothing is strained out later. In a pot of sencha, the leaves stay behind in the strainer. In a bowl of matcha, there is no strainer.

Ground on stone

Ippodo describes matcha as produced by using a stone mill to grind the leaves into a fine powder, and it describes the result as having a natural vibrant green color, a prominent fragrance and a smooth, rich flavor. Ito En adds a point about timing: tencha that is stone ground immediately before shipping is what it calls matcha. The leaf waits as tencha, and the powder is made close to shipping.

Ceremonial and culinary: what the labels mean

A tin may say "ceremonial grade" or "culinary grade." Neither phrase is a regulated grade. When the ISO report came out in 2022, NARO noted that there was no consensus or rules for matcha in the international market, and that it planned to work toward an international standard defining the range of chemical components related to quality. Until such a standard exists, a grade word on a tin is the seller's own description.

Ippodo does not use the term at all. In its words, "this term was invented to market matcha overseas," and it is not used in Japan. Ippodo says all of its matcha is suitable for drinking on its own and is used in tea ceremonies in Japan and abroad.

What does differ between matchas is where each one sits on a range of flavor. Ippodo explains its own range this way: matchas at the lighter end are lighter in color, flavor and aroma, with more astringency, while matchas at the richer end are a brighter, deeper green, with sweeter aromas, more umami and less astringency. It suggests that newcomers start with its Sayaka-no-mukashi blend, then move up the range if that tastes too mild or down if it tastes too rich. Cooking is a use, not a lower rung: Ippodo recommends two of its blends, Wakaki-shiro and Hatsu-mukashi, for baking, and says both are also great for drinking straight or in a latte.

The useful questions to ask of any matcha, then, are the ones a label can answer directly: where it was grown, its color, and how the maker suggests using it. Mariage Frères Matcha Midori, for example, is a powdered Japanese green tea from Miyazaki, sold in a 40 gram sealed tin and meant to be whisked rather than steeped (shop Mariage Frères Matcha Midori).

The tools

Matcha needs only a few things, and each one has a job.

A bowl. Matcha is whisked right in the bowl, so the bowl needs room for the whisk. Fellow designs its matcha bowl for "seamless whisking."
A bamboo whisk. The chasen is a whisk handmade from bamboo, with many fine tips. Fellow describes its bamboo whisk as tuned for smooth, foamy matcha.
A sifter. Sifting the powder before adding water breaks up clumps. Fellow describes its sifter as finely etched "for clump-free matcha," and Ippodo says taking the time to sift produces thick and creamy koicha, the style described below.
A scoop or spoon, and ideally a small scale, since the recipes below are written in grams.

Fellow's Matcha Set includes all of these with a ceramic tea tray: a ceramic bowl with a spout, a bamboo whisk with a ceramic whisk stand, and a stainless steel spoon and sifter. Fellow sizes the bowl at 380 milliliters, made for about 140 milliliters of matcha, roughly two servings (shop the Fellow Matcha Set). Fellow's sifting method is to set the sifter on the bowl, weigh about 2 grams of matcha onto it, and sweep the powder across the holes with the back of the spoon, "like polishing the surface rather than pressing down," for about 30 seconds for one or two scoops.

How to whisk a bowl

There are two classic ways to prepare matcha. Usucha is the everyday bowl, a small amount of powder whisked briskly in more water. Koicha uses twice the powder and half the water, whisked slowly into a thick, creamy tea. A third option is whisking with cold water. The recipes below are Ippodo's, with Fellow's recipe for its set beside them.

Style	Matcha	Water	Whisking
Usucha (Ippodo)	2 g, sifted (about 1 level teaspoon)	60 ml at 80°C (176°F)	Vigorously for 15 seconds
Koicha (Ippodo)	4 g, sifted (about 2 level teaspoons)	30 ml at 80°C (176°F)	Slowly for 15 seconds
Cold-whisked (Ippodo)	2 g, sifted	60 ml chilled water	Vigorously for 15 seconds
Fellow Matcha Set	2 g, sifted	65 g at 180°F (about 82°C)	20 to 30 seconds

The method for a bowl of usucha runs like this:

Sift the matcha into the bowl.
Pour in the water. Ippodo's recipe calls for 80°C (176°F), so water that has just boiled needs to cool first.
Whisk vigorously for about 15 seconds.
Work quickly. Ippodo says preparing usucha quickly is the secret to enjoying its full fragrance.

Ippodo says whisking with cold or chilled water brings out a strong sweetness, which makes the cold bowl worth trying on a warm afternoon. For a latte, Fellow suggests 5 grams of matcha whisked into 50 grams of 180°F water, then topped with 150 milliliters of cold milk or 230 milliliters of steamed milk.

Water: temperature and type

Both recipe sources land in the same place: Ippodo at 80°C (176°F), Fellow at 180°F. That is well below boiling, and the green tea guide explains how hotter water pulls more of the astringent catechins from green tea. With matcha the leaf stays in the bowl, so there is no steep time to shorten as a correction.

In Denver the kettle starts lower. The USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service says the boiling point of water drops just under 1°F for every 500 feet of elevation, from 212°F at sea level. At Denver's 5,280 feet, that arithmetic puts a boil near 202°F. That is still about 26°F above Ippodo's target, so water straight off a Denver boil still needs to cool. The Denver altitude cooking guide has the rest of the numbers.

The water itself matters too. Ippodo says soft water, which holds fewer dissolved minerals, tends to bring out umami, while hard water gives a crisper cup from the same tea. It advises against distilled water, since some minerals are needed for good flavor, and its New York shop uses filtered tap water. The simplest test it offers: the best water for tea is water that tastes good on its own.

Caring for the whisk

A chasen is handmade from bamboo, and Ippodo is plain that it will not last forever. The sign it is time for a new one is many broken tips and a whisk that no longer whisks matcha as easily as it once did. Fellow advises washing its whisk by hand and setting it on its stand to dry.

How to store matcha

Ippodo's storage advice for its teas is to keep them away from direct sunlight, heat, humidity and strong smells, at room temperature, with the bag rolled closed, clipped, and stored on its own or in its can. For matcha, it says people who finish a can within about two weeks can pour the powder straight into the can for convenience; everyone else should keep the rolled bag inside the can.

On freshness, Ippodo recommends drinking its tea within about one month of opening for the best flavor and aroma. Unopened tea kept past its best-before date can go in the freezer, but Ippodo's method is specific: when it comes out, leave the sealed package at room temperature for about five hours so any condensation, the water that beads on a cold package in warm air, evaporates before it is opened. Once opened, the tea should not go back into the freezer. A small tin, opened and finished within the month, keeps matcha at its freshest.

Matcha beyond the bowl

Matcha also goes into blends and the kitchen. Mariage Frères Sencha Matcha Émeraude blends Japanese sencha leaf with matcha, so a steeped pot picks up matcha's color and body (shop Sencha Matcha Émeraude). Mariage Frères Genmaïcha Matcha Émeraude combines Japanese green tea with roasted rice and matcha (shop Genmaïcha Matcha Émeraude). For a first pot of plain leaf tea, the sencha brewing recipe walks through it step by step, and the green tea ice cream recipe shows how to keep matcha's color bright in a custard. The rest of the tea range sits in one place (shop tea).

The shop is at 263 Josephine Street in Cherry Creek, Denver. Visitors can ask staff questions in the shop. Products ship across the continental U.S. from theambrosianpantry.com.

Every step in making matcha, from the shade cloth over the bushes to the stone mill, works toward one goal: a leaf good enough to be eaten whole. That is also why the words on a tin matter less than the habits in the kitchen. A matcha is only as good as its last few minutes, and those belong to whoever sifts it, cools the water and keeps the tin closed.