It's All About Tea — japanese tea ceremony

Have you ever heard about Chabana before? It’s similar to Ikebana — Japanese flower arrangement. However, Chabana (茶花) is a flower arrangement explicitly done for tea ceremonies. Cha meaning tea, and bana meaning flower in Japanese. (Read more)

When you want to make your matcha in the traditional Japanese style, it's essential to invest in a proper Japanese tea set. A basic tea set will include a chawan (matcha bowl), chasen (matcha whisk), and chashaku (matcha scoop). If you want a complete Japanese tea set, however, you should also get a furui (tea sift), and a kusenaoshi (chasen holder). By the way, this is only if you want to enjoy matcha at home, casually. If you're going to make matcha as per the ways of Chado, you need much more equipment. So, if you want to make a proper bowl of frothy green matcha, if nothing else, you should always have quality matcha tea powder and a chasen. So how do we take care of the matcha whisk to ensure its longevity for years of umami-rich tea bowls to come? (Read more)

In our recent blog post, we talked about the history of the Japanese tea sage — Sen no Rikyu. Without a doubt, he had a significant effect on The Way of Tea in Japan, and his legacy continues to this day. Ultimately, there are three separate schools of Chanoyu (Japanese tea ceremony) that follow his teachings to this day, though they differ slightly. These schools are referred to as "San Senke" — Three Sen Families. (Read more)

Sen no Rikyu (1522 – 1591) is known by everyone to have the most profound influence on chanoyu, the Japanese "Way of Tea". Also known as matcha tea ceremony. Rikyu took to tiny grass-hut tea houses for his tea practices and kept promoting the wabi-sabi style of tea ceremony that he and his tea master started. (Read more)

Chashitsu is the Japanese term for a tea room. It is a little hut, resembling a house, where Japanese tea ceremonies (chanoyu) would take place. Following tradition, matcha green tea is always served in the chashitsu, alongside some simple sweets prepared by the tea master. It is said that chashitsu started appearing during the Sengoku period (mid-15th century to early 17th century). Before then, tea was commonly enjoyed in separate rooms and not in individual tea huts. (Read more)