Gyokuro Mihatsumi

Yoshida-san’s highest grade single cultivar Gyokuro from Ogura area in Uji.

The Mihatsumi gyokuro is one of the rare top-level gyokuros made from a single cultivar. In this sense, its taste profile isn't crafted from blending various cultivars together (each excelling in a specific aspect of taste/smell/color/etc.) but from extreme attention to growing conditions, harvest timing, and transformation methods used. As a cultivar, Samidori is interesting in and of itself because it is lighter, with fresh aromatics (zesty even) and an equal balance between sweetness and umami. Grown with care under a traditional straw roof and shaded for 40 days, this special tea is harvested once a year by hand, only picking the last three leaves at the end of each branch. Coming from a 16th-generation award-winning producer in Uji, this is what dedication to the leaf tastes like.