Uji Gyokuro, Classic Representation of Japanese Green Tea

Uji Gyokuro of a very fine quality “Purple Cloud” grade, a classic representation of premium Japanese steamed green tea.

uji gyokuro うじぎょくろ宇治玉露, steamed green tea
origin: Kyoto, Japan

Gyokuro, aka Jade Dew, is the name of a special quality class of Japanese steamed green tea (i.e. sencha).(note) It originated in Uji in south of Kyoto. There are different quality grades within this class. They are named with poetic references rather than numbers, such as Crane, or Pine, or Purple Clouds etc, by the producers.

production regions

Currently, Uji, and the Prefectures of Shizuoka and Fukuoka are the key production areas in Japan. Uji and Yame ( 八女 ) in Fukuoka compete in various ways to be the best region. Productions also take place in the provinces of Zhejiang and Sichuan in China for both the domestic Japanese market and the export markets.

We shall look at a best gyokuro from Uji in this article and discuss how it can be best enjoyed, from the perspectives of taste and health. Before we do that, there are a few concepts we need to re-align so we can understand this particular green tea better.

Girls making tea at home. The teapot and steamed green tea, such as Gyokuro, has been part of the daily life in Japan since antiquity

gyokuro: one of the steamed green teas

Firstly, there are four subcategories of green teas, and the steamed green tea that most people take as Japanese tea is under one of these subcategories. <read more about green tea as a category>

Secondly, there are other tea production methods practiced in Japan other than steaming. Roasting and making of semi-fermented teas (not as oolong) are some of them, we shall look at them in other articles.

Thirdly, there are other steamed green tea varieties, such as tencha for grinding into matcha in Japan, and Emei Maofeng, a traditional whole-leaf tea from Sichuan, China. All in all, gyokuro is a fine green tea variety that is produced by a special process involving steaming, and there are different levels of quality and slight variations dependent on origins and production styles.