Matcha Isn't Just Powdered Green Tea: 7 Japanese Tea Terms Explained

Order a "green tea" in Japan and you could be handed seven different drinks. They share a family name, the same plant, and often the same farm. What separates them is everything that happens after the leaf is grown.

This is the first post in our Tea 101 series: tea, explained properly, without the jargon.

It all starts with one plant

Sencha, tencha, matcha, hojicha, aracha, gyokuro and kabusecha are not different plants. They all come from Camellia sinensis. The difference is in the growing and processing: whether the leaf is shaded, steamed, rolled, roasted, refined or milled.

• Unshaded + rolled → sencha
• Shaded + unrolled → tencha → matcha
• Finished green tea + roasted → hojicha
• Before final refining → aracha
• Shaded + rolled → gyokuro / kabusecha

Sencha, tencha, matcha: three different outcomes

Sencha (煎茶)

Steamed, rolled, then dried. Bright, vegetal and refreshing. This is the everyday loose-leaf green tea of Japan.

Tencha (碾茶)

Shaded before harvest, steamed, then dried without rolling. Tencha is the leaf that becomes matcha.

Matcha (抹茶)

Tencha, finely milled. Because it's a powder you whisk into water, you consume the whole leaf.

Powdered sencha still isn't matcha. If it didn't start as shaded, unrolled tencha, it isn't matcha, however fine it's ground.

The ones people confuse

Aracha (荒茶)

Tea before final refining. It's a stage in production, not a tea type.

Hojicha (ほうじ茶)

Finished green tea that has been roasted. Toasty and nutty, with low astringency.

Gyokuro (玉露)

Shaded and rolled, typically with longer shading. The result is deeper umami.

Kabusecha (かぶせ茶)

Also shaded and rolled, typically with shorter shading, for a fresher balance.

The Japanese tea cheat sheet

Where MUA CHA fits

Everything we sell from Japan comes from Wazuka, Kyoto, and is JAS certified organic. Our Okumidori and Yabukita are single-cultivar matcha, milled from tencha. Our Hojicha is roasted tencha, the same shaded leaf grown for matcha.

Follow @muachatea for more Tea 101.