Raw material requirements: Matcha requires high quality of raw materials, requiring the use of tea with high contents of amino acids, protein and chlorophyll, and low content of caffeine in raw materials. Before picking, there are requirements for the picking time and leaf size of fresh tea. The production time of matcha is short, only about 50 days. With high-quality fresh tea produced in April and May as raw materials, the quality of matcha produced is the best. The species of tea used for processing matcha are also exquisite. This kind of tea tree is cultivated by clonal propagation technology, which ensures the purity of tea varieties. In addition, in order to ensure the quality of fresh leaves, in the process of planting, the staff also need to shade the tea trees for heatstroke prevention. The tea produced in this way is called covered tea. Matcha is made from covered tea.
In Japan, because the processing cost of grinding with natural stone mill is too high, poor quality tea is generally not used to produce matcha. Ordinary steamed green tea or even simply covered steamed green tea is used to make green tea powder, which is called powdered green tea in Japan.
In China, due to the lack of stone mill grinding technology (the existing stone mill has been patented by Yuzhi Matcha Company), some processing plants use jet mills to produce green tea powder. In the past two years, some tea farmers have also started to make green tea powder with better tea raw materials. In order to sell their products at a good price, they named their green tea powder-Matcha.
1.cultivation of Matcha ―― The raw material for covering matcha is a small camellia oleifera abel. that has not been twisted, and it is called ground tea in Japan. Its production has two key words: covering and steaming. 20 days before picking spring tea, scaffolding must be set up to cover reed curtains and straw curtains, and the shading rate can reach more than 98%. There are also simple covers, and the shading rate can only reach 70 ~ 85% if covered with black plastic gauze. Experiments show that shading tea with different materials and colors has different effects. Japanese scholar Yaozi Takei's research shows: "Covering and shading changes environmental factors such as light intensity, light quality and temperature, thus affecting the formation of tea aroma quality. Open-air tea does not contain B- sandalwood alcohol, benzoic acid and its esters, and the content of other aroma components is significantly lower than that of shade tea except for the higher content of lower aliphatic compounds. Chlorophyll and amino acids of covered green tea increased obviously, carotenoid was1.5 times that of open-air cultivation, its total amino acids were 1.4 times that of natural cultivation, and chlorophyll was 1.6 times that of natural cutting.
2. Processing of Matcha-Fresh tea leaves picked by steam deactivation are dried on the same day, and the steam deactivation method is adopted. The research of Japanese scholar Shenjin Xiu and Shang Michiko respectively showed that in the steaming process, the oxides such as cis -3- hexenol, cis -3- hexenoate and linalool in tea increased greatly, and a large number of ionone compounds such as A- ionone and B- ionone were produced. The precursors of these aroma components were carotenoids, which constituted the special aroma and taste of Matcha. Therefore, the tea covered with cultivated green tea and steam-immobilized is not only special in aroma, green in color and more delicious in taste. Table 3 Effect of light on chemical composition of tea leaves (ug%g) Light conditions Chlorophyll total nitrogen content lysine arginine simple catechin natural light 0.28 4.47 731756 3.01shading 0.444 4.90136 404510.88 "Tea biology" Third edition? Wan Xiaochun? Editor in chief? China Agricultural Publishing House
3. Grinding of matcha-superfine grinding of tea leaves. Matcha (matcha), its original intention is to use a stone mill to grind tea. The stone mill for grinding tea is called the tea mill. Huang Tingjian, a poet in the Northern Song Dynasty, first described the tea mill: "It was only used when it was soaked in poor taste mortar, and then it was ground at the beginning. The plan is extremely ingenious, and I believe that a wise man can create things. " Tea mill is completely different from the stone mill that we usually see grinding soybean milk flour, and its production is extremely complicated. Modern tea mills in China are on the verge of extinction. It is said that there are fewer craftsmen who can make tea mills in Japan. The stone mill runs slowly, and a tea mill works for one hour, producing only 40 grams of Matcha, which is less than a grip. Matcha appears as an "irregular torn sheet" under the microscope, and its granularity is 2 ~ 20 microns (680 ~ 6800 mesh), which is almost the height that all modern mechanical crushing can't climb. Moreover, the peculiar temperature of the tea superfine powder machine is the last fragrance-enhancing process of matcha. Matcha ground by the tea superfine powder machine has the fragrance of seaweed and zongye. So far, no country has debugged the essence of matcha, and it is pure natural. After years of research on the ancient stone mill with the most advanced engineering technology and electronic equipment, the Japanese stone mill expert and professor Sanlun sighed: "For Matcha, at least at present, any mechanical grinding can't be better than the stone mill." In recent years, matcha is more used in processing industry. In order to reduce the processing cost, it is also processed by ball mill, and in China, it is also processed by jet mill. Because the stone mill for grinding matcha has been patented by Yuzhi Matcha Co., Ltd. in China, it has caused a saliva war, and many tea powder processors have questioned whether matcha must be ground with a stone mill. Right and wrong, this question is to be judged by friends who have drunk matcha produced by different grinding methods.
Maybe the key is to look.
1.Whether its fineness can make the refreshments foam,
2. Whether it can be suspended without precipitation.
3. Whether it has the unique dull seaweed aroma of matcha. Drinking matcha usually follows the Japanese tea ceremony, which requires a series of complicated rules. The basic method is to put a small amount of matcha in a tea bowl, add a small amount of warm (not boiling) water, and then stir it evenly (traditionally, the tea basket is used). In Japanese tea ceremony, 4 grams of matcha and 60CC of boiling water are used for "strong tea", which is a bit like paste. "Thin tea" uses 2 grams of matcha and 60CC of boiling water. You can use the tea basket to brush out a thick foam, which is very beautiful and refreshing.