You may be familiar with traditional green tea, but have you ever heard of Genmaicha green tea? It’s a special combination of green tea with roasted rice that just so happens to taste like popcorn. Sounds pretty dreamy, right?
It also has a number of health benefits that will motivate you to get your brew on!
The History
Legend has it that the creation of Genmaicha occurred during the 15th century when a servant named Genmai inadvertently dropped a handful of roasted rice into his Samurai master's tea. The master found the resulting blend of green tea and roasted rice to be quite delicious and ordered it to be made again. This accidental discovery led to the creation of genmaicha! which is now a popular tea in Japan and around the world. The addition of roasted rice gives the tea a nutty, toasty flavour and a pleasant aroma, which makes this a hearty brew🍃
Flavour
During the roasting process, many of the brown rice grains pop like popcorn does. So, when this is ground and combined with green tea, it gives Genmaicha a delicious nutty flavour that resembles fresh popcorn. Yes please!
Being quite different to traditional green tea, which has a more earthy and green colour, you’ll find that Genmaicha has a more sweet and nutty flavour that's more yellow in colour.
You can even add your favourite milk for a creamy flavour that enhances the nutty aroma of Genmaicha.
What is Genmaicha Green Tea?
Our Genmaicha is an infused, organic Japanese brown rice green tea that combines a delicious blend of sencha green tea and roasted brown rice.
Genmaicha is typically made with bancha green tea, but we use sencha green tea for ours due to its higher quality.
A little more on this:
There are two types of green tea, bancha and sencha. Both are harvested from the same plant, but are harvested at different times of the growing season. Sencha is made up of the upper leaves and buds of the plant, making it higher quality and higher in price. Whereas Bancha is made from the mature leaves that are harvested later in the season, that are lower quality and more affordable.
The Benefits
Green tea is known to contain some pretty great health benefits and Japanese rice tea is certainly no different. Genmaicha contains protective plant compounds that are found within the tea leaves. This includes green tea catechins like EGCG.
Catechins are a common type of compound found in green tea that work to neutralise responsive molecules, like free radicals, that can contribute to cell damage. EGCG is a highly potent green tea catechin and is rich in antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties.
Drinking Genmaicha regularly may assist your body’s antioxidant defences and help to reduce cell damage.
What’s Your Style- Tea Bags or Loose Leaf?
Do you prefer your tea loose or in tea bags? Well, we do both! Brew your delicious Genmaicha with our biodegradable tea bags or enjoy our organic loose leaf green tea and pair it with your favourite infuser or strainer.
How to Brew
Combine 1x tea bag or a single strainer/infuser containing the loose leaf Genmaicha with boiling water (100 degrees celsius) in your favourite mug. Allow it to steep for 3-5 minutes before enjoying.
To give your Genmaicha a delicious and creamy twist, try adding honey or sugar while the tea is steeping, then add a dash of your favourite milk. Enjoy it warm or allow it to cool and add to a glass with ice for a refreshing milk tea.
At Athella we love it when you discover a new tea to try, so we are giving you a HUGE 50% off our Genmaicha, purchase your bag today, we can assure, you wont be disappointed 🍃
If you have any questions about our Genmaicha Japanese Organic Green Tea or any of our other products, please get in touch with us and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can. Happy brewing!