It has been a long time, but I finally opened the sencha that I got… last year! That’s later than I would like and I’m just glad it was properly sealed.

I got this 星野さつき (Hoshino Satsuki) sencha from Karel Capek, but it actually comes from Hoshino Seichaen (星野製茶園) in Yame, Fukuoka. The Hoshino Satsuki sencha is their star sencha and is supposed to be a great representative of Yame’s flavours, scent, and colour.

First Impressions

The tea leaves were really green and they looked very fine, slightly finer than the Sayama senchas that I’ve been drinking. They smell like the typical sencha, which makes me happy given that I love sencha.

Tasting Notes

The first cup of tea was a rich green colour that was only mildly scented. In terms of taste, this packed quite a punch – I had strong sweet and vegetal notes, very much like how you’d imagine Plato’s sencha might be. The tea lingers pleasantly in the throat and it’s overall a nice cup of tea.

The second steep looked slightly darker but tasted very similar to the first steep. In fact, most of the subsequent steeps had the same flavour profile, with a dominant vegetal note. The only difference between the steeps is that the sweetness gradually decreased. By the fifth steep, it was a weaker, though still distinct, vegetal note that remained. I could have pushed the tea further, but both times, I stopped around here.

The spent leaves looked like mush, that’s the best word I could find for it. It didn’t feel like mush, but I could see that the leaves were, in general, very small and resulted in looking like it was very soft. It also meant that in general, you didn’t need to steep these leaves for very long – I took about 45 seconds for the first steep, as recommended on the packet and pretty much kept it there until the fourth or fifth steep (and even then I probably only steeped about a minute or so).

Overall Thoughts

This was a very well-balanced and pleasant sencha. I really liked how intense the flavours were at the start, and the fact that you can steep this multiple times. If you prefer lighter teas, you may not like this as much, but if you’re in the mood for sencha, this should hit the spot.