Lately, Japanese tea has been familiar overseas, not only inside. It is said Thai have sweet green tea suited to spicy dishes in Thailand and Moroccans supply mint tea based on green in Morocco. Anyway, it means you can drink Japanese tea not just in Japan.
Sashima Tea in Ibaraki prefecture is said to be a pioneer of Japanese tea introduced to foreign lands. No more kinds of tea are produced there than this. Sashima district is the center of Kanto Plain. So the soil is acid for a pile of old volcanic ash. They say it is good to tea leaves.
Kind: Yabukita, Kanaya-midori
Tea Kind: Deep-steam sencha
Price: 1,080 JPN (100 g)
Leaching Time: 50 - 70 sec.
Raising Sashima Tea was started in the beginning of Edo Era. At the time in Japan, the West area like Osaka was more advanced than the East in technique, culture and business. It is said they learnt the ABC from Kyoto and tried improving hard around 1830, because that was basically not of high quality.
Then, Nakayama Motonari, a tea manufacturer at the time introduced the improved Sashima Tea to the United States. In 1859, the real export began. Accordingly, Sashima Tea in Ibaraki prefecture is said to be a pioneer of Japanese tea introduced to foreign lands.
In Ibaraki, there are many tea manufacturers who grow, produce and sell by themselves consistently. Iidaen is one of them. Their Sashima Tea; Mareten can let you feel their trial for over 200 years in Sashima district, with the deep taste.