4 replies to this topic

[johnsmith45678]

I read this here:

Matcha (MAH-cha)  When you drink a cuppa matcha (also spelled maccha), you're getting green tea's powerful antioxidants to the max, because you're actually consuming the whole green tea leaf in powdered form. In Japan, slightly bitter matcha is traditionally served syrupy thick. But in the US, you'll find matcha stirred into lattes, sprinkled on ice cream, and used to bolster energy drinks and turn smoothies into pick-me-ups (it's said to boost alertness). Just be respectful of matcha if you're caffeine sensitive: Ounce for ounce, it has almost as much caffeine as coffee.

I've check Vitamin Cottage (the local chain of health food stores) and searched online. Looks like Matcha is pretty hard to come by -- I was only able to find VitaLife offering it and/or some Japanese brand of tea. Anybody know where to get matcha?

[JasonTrue]

Matcha's pretty easy to find these days. Most Japanese markets carry some, and almost every tea company these days offers something that uses matcha, including companies like Remedy. It's not primarily marketed in health food stores, but by tea companies, because it's meant for drinking, not as a supplement.

My web store offers cooking matcha, a green tea latte mix, and ceremonial grades from a Seattle-based tea company, Three Tree Tea. One of my other tea vendors, MyGreenTea, also produced matcha-iri genmaicha, which is brewed tea with toasted rice and added matcha for flavor.

I personally like mine infused in gin.

I read this here:

Matcha (MAH-cha)  When you drink a cuppa matcha (also spelled maccha), you're getting green tea's powerful antioxidants to the max, because you're actually consuming the whole green tea leaf in powdered form. In Japan, slightly bitter matcha is traditionally served syrupy thick. But in the US, you'll find matcha stirred into lattes, sprinkled on ice cream, and used to bolster energy drinks and turn smoothies into pick-me-ups (it's said to boost alertness). Just be respectful of matcha if you're caffeine sensitive: Ounce for ounce, it has almost as much caffeine as coffee.

I've check Vitamin Cottage (the local chain of health food stores) and searched online. Looks like Matcha is pretty hard to come by -- I was only able to find VitaLife offering it and/or some Japanese brand of tea. Anybody know where to get matcha?

[Beebs]

Best places to find matcha are tea retail shops; most shops will either carry some version of matcha, and if they don't, they'll likely know where you might find it in your area. Asian & some gourmet markets may also have it available. I get mine from Tealeaves.com (they have a shop in my area, but mailorder is available too), and they grind matcha in-house so it's nice & fresh. Suggest calling them as I don't think matcha is listed on their website (tel 1-888-291-TEAS).

Some types of matcha that you might find at Asian food stores may be improperly labelled as "matcha", but should actually be labelled as "powdered green tea". True matcha is produced from particular grades of Japanese green tea, whereas powdered green tea is, well, any green tea that is powdered, usually Chinese or Taiwanese. This stuff is perfectly fine for cooking, desserts, lattes, etc. and still has all the health benefits as real Japanese matcha -- but will be easier on the wallet.

Powdered green tea & matcha are pretty bleah on they're own (unless it's the really good ceremonial grade stuff!). It's nice as an iced latte with a shot of vanilla syrup -- yum!

[chamekke]

A couple of tips. First of all, matcha should really come with a "best by" date. If it's missing, the matcha may still be OK - but you might be taking a chance. Stale matcha is not worth drinking (although sometimes you can still cook or bake with it).

Also, I'm told that the best matcha sellers keep the unopen tins refrigerated. Again, this isn't as common as you might hope. But it helps to preserve the tea's freshness.

I study Chadou (Japanese tea ceremony), and most of the time I don't have to buy matcha myself because my tea teacher keeps bringing it back from Japan for us! This is lucky, since the matcha that's available locally is usually not very good. The best I've found so far is the ceremonial matcha sold by Blenz, the coffee-shop franchise. Although they don't refrigerate it (and I don't think they use a best-by date), it is still very good, and I've certainly never opened a tin to find it stale. But I think Blenz is still restricted to British Columbia, Canada, so this may not be too helpful to most people.

There are some online sellers who will ship directly from Japan. If I had to buy my own on a regular basis, that's probably where I'd go.

[PandoraLost]

Asian markets and many tea vendors will sell a decent to good Matcha powder. the tea company Teavana offers an okay matcha, along with matcha-making utensils. I'm not sure that they use a best-by date, though the seals on their packaging are really excellent.

About refrigerating tea: honestly, much like coffee, it doesn't make a huge difference for short-term storage. An Asian market would move through matcha pretty quick, so they're the best resource (they also have multiple brands and varieties!). I would only really recommend putting either in cold storage if the seal on the container wasn't as good. Kept in a dark, relatively cool place, tea and coffee keep perfectly well simply in airtight containers.