Hairs in your tea

If you watch the surface of your green tea carefully, and look at the right angle, you'll see there is tiny lint-like hairs floating. That's a good sign. You should be glad that you have hairs in your tea. It's proof that your Sencha is made from fresh young leaves.

Quality Japanese Sencha is made from the top three leaves, new shoots, and young fresh leaves. When the tea leaves are very young, they are covered with tiny hairs to protect against natural enemies until they grow big and strong.

Right after the harvest to stop oxidation, tea leaves are rushed to the processing center to go through the steaming machine. Those tiny hairs will stay with the tea leaves through out the tea making process until you pour the hot water, and then they will float to the surface as the tea leaves sink.

That's why you have hairs in your fresh quality Sencha.

Indian Summer and Cold Soaking

We have had over 100 degrees the past 2 days here in Laytonville, Mendocino County, California.
It's the usual hot Indian Summer days after experiencing a rather mild summer this year.

Brewing, Steeping, or Infusing, these are all actions of soaking in a liquid. So I named it "Cold Soaking" for this tea bag steeping.
The cold brewed Gyokuro was great, so I tried tea bags instead of the loose tea leaves.
I left it in a refrigerator just over night, not 24 hours. It turned out to be another great tasting cold Sencha in a handy plastic bottle for a hot Indian Summer day.