The finest yabukita leaves grown in Wazuka in Uji, the site of Kyoto’s best sencha production, are blended with a small accent of meiryoku and sayamakaori leaves (also from Wazuka). This combination gives us the distinctive yabukita aroma and umami paired with meiryoku’s subtle sweetness and sayamakaori’s unique scent and astringency. The finished product offers a well-balanced flavor.

The Wazuka River runs through the center of Wazuka, and a hilly area spreads out around the town at an elevation ranging between 200 and 400 meters. Everywhere you look, green tea estates stretch out from the foot of the hills to their peaks. Their orderly appearance makes it readily clear that skilled production methods are alive and well here. Among the tea-producing sites in the region, Wazuka is well-known for its regular pruning regimen throughout the year, which aids the harvest and keeps crops in peak condition.

Uji is the oldest tea-producing region in Japan; most major production techniques developed here first. In particular, the development of unparalleled methods for steamed tea production here helped Japanese green teas – sencha, gyokuro, matcha, and other varieties – yield their unique flavors. Ishitera and Kamazuka are two sites in Wazuka most famous for their green tea production.

Yabukita 70%　Meiryoku 20%　Sayamakaori 10%

Blends are generally used in order to standardize the flavor of a mass-produced harvest over a sustained period. By contrast, this sencha blend brings together different components in order to achieve a complex flavor balance otherwise, impossible with a single leaf type. As an agriculture product subject to the vicissitudes of nature, some variation in quality and flavor is inevitable in green tea production; rather than trying to standardize the crop, taking that variation as a positive and carefully combining elements, as seen here, yields a balanced yet complex flavor profile.。

The high grade of green teas produced in Wazuka comes from the corresponding high level of skill with which the tea is cultivated through all steps of the process, from planting to processing. This begins with careful management of the plants’ growth, shade-growing before the harvest, gentle pruning of the leaves with fine scissors, and the final drying process. For that final step, several drying vessels are used and the leaves are dried with the bare minimum of heat, thereby retaining their fresh aroma and flavor.