Kooridashi Ice Brewed Gyokuro in glass cups

Green Tea | May 01, 2021 | C. Yu

How To Make Kooridashi Ice Brewed Gyokuro

Kooridashi Ice Brewed Gyokuro introduces a fun brewing technique that brings a new experience in iced Japanese gyokuro shade-grown tea preparation. Notably, the taste of the tea will vary based on your cold brew tea methods and water temperature.

Gyokuro is a high-grade sencha prepared from the tips of tea leaves shaded from sunlight two weeks before harvest. This tea boasts a mild and sweet umami taste and is reknown for its high caffeine content and great health benefits. Unlike conventional brewing methods that utilize hot water, with the Kooridashi Ice Brewing method, you simply combine tea leaves and ice. By avoiding hot water, which tends to bring out the astringent flavor from catechin in the tea leaves. Therefore, it allows amino acids to emerge at lower temperature, resulting in more umami and sweeter flavor.

Kooridashi literally means “ice-out” in Japanese. In this unique Japanese tea brewing method, we will simply be putting tea leaves and ice together in a pot, and leave to melt naturally. Whether left at room temperature for 4-5 hours or overnight in the fridge.

Additionally, to create your own refreshing Japanese Gyokuro Cold Brew, follow the steps below:

In making Ice brewed Gyokuro Tea You will need:

10g Gyokuro tea leaves
50g Ice Cubes

two kooridashi iced brewed japanese gyokuro tea in glass cups

How to make Kooridashi Ice Brewed Gyokuro Green Tea:

Put the tea leaves in a kyusu or teapot (with a capacity of 500-700ml) without a tea strainer and spread thinly for easy extraction. *Using a tea strainer is not recommended, as the extracted tea may get lukewarm over time at room temperature. If you would like to use a tea strainer, we would encourage you to leave the ice to melt in the fridge overnight.
Put the ice directly on top of the tea leaves,. We reccomend using ice made from filtered water or mineral water for a more delicious flavor.
Let the teapot sit at room temperature for 4 to 5 hours or leave it in the fridge overnight. Gently shake the pot after the ice melts to even out the tea extract. Pour into the cup(s) and enjoy the beautiful green color and wonderful umami flavor!

Subsequently, after the Kooridashi Ice Brewing method, the tea leaves now open, can be easily reused to make cold brew tea. While the resulting color and taste may not be as strong as Kooridashi, it will still be delicious.

Finally, feel free to try the Kooridashi, Unique Japanese Gyokuro Cold Brew Method with other green teas as well and let us know what you think!