A very rare cultivar. Wakoucha Tasting Tea N°23: Kimura Wakoucha Benitsukuba, Kimura Teafarm, First Flush 2017, Yutaka Tee

Very typical for the Wakoucha culture in Japan is that it is still very much experimenting and looking for its different voices. The experiments try out different methods and terroirs, but they also try out different cultivars, and some of these are very rare. The Benitsukuba cultivar was registered in 1958 in Ibaraki, from undefined parents, and is only found in the immediate area. One of the few producers who use it is Mr Kimura from the Kimura teafarm in Sashami, Ibaraki, to the north of Tokyo. He only makes a very small quantity of it every year but has been doing it for a while now.

Kimura Black tea Benitsukuba, Kimura Teafarm, Ibaraki, First Flush 2017, Yutaka Tee:

Harvested May 2017, first flush, at 50m above sea level. 20 euro for 100 gram. Very limited production.

17th of August 2019, 3 grams, 150ml, 2 mins, 98°C, in a kyusu. The dry leaves smell strongly like chocolate with some eucalyptus in the background. Dark, highly oxidated leaf (this is after all a 'beni' or 'black' cultivar, very complete, very nice looking. The wet leaves smell like chocolate with a touch of mustiness reminding me a bit op Pu'er. Coppery red infusion, with a yellowish-green hue. The aroma of the infusion has hints of chocolate and a hovering sweetness that never breaks really through, and again these tones of fermentation. A quite peculiar tea because when freshly infused it shows almost nothing of the typical Wakoucha sweetness. It does however bring a clear Assamica touch. When cooling down the Assamica 'yunnan' character seems to disappear and is replaced by the chocolaty tones of a Wakoucha, and also in the taste this comes up, first mostly in the finish and as the tea cools down more upfront. I did not particularly like the first nips of this tea, it needed some time to grow on me, and it excelled in the finish, which is definitely very cocoa and very nice. A very interesting tea as it kept developing in the cup, becoming more and more complex.

😊😊😊(😊)

The tea was in January 2020 still available on the Yutaka website: https://www.yutaka-tee.de/de/kimura-schwarzer-tee-benitsukuba.html