Ingredient

Green tea

Green tea is tea whose picked leaves were heated quickly enough to stop them oxidising, so they stay green and taste fresh and vegetal rather than malty. It is also the tea most easily ruined by boiling water, which is why so many people think they dislike it.

Steamed or pan-fired, and why it matters

The heating that stops oxidation is done two ways, and it splits green tea into two families that taste noticeably different.

Japanese green tea is steamed. Steam is fast and wet, and it leaves the leaf tasting of the sea and freshly cut grass — sencha, gyokuro and the tencha that becomes matcha are all made this way. The liquid is often slightly cloudy and deep green.

Chinese green tea is pan-fired. Dry heat in a wok adds a toasted, nutty, sometimes chestnut note on top of the vegetal one — Longjing and gunpowder are the familiar examples. The liquid is clearer and more yellow-green.

Neither is better. But a recipe or a brewing instruction written for one can be actively wrong for the other, and "green tea" on a packet does not tell you which you have.

How to stop it tasting bitter

Green tea has more of the compounds that taste astringent still intact than black tea does, because nothing has been allowed to convert them. That makes extraction control the whole game.

• Let the kettle stand. Around 70 to 80°C is the usual advice, and the simplest way to get there without a thermometer is to boil, then wait two or three minutes, or pour a little cold water into the pot first.
• Brew it briefly. One to two minutes for most. Gyokuro is brewed cooler and longer; gunpowder can take slightly hotter.
• Use less leaf than you would for black tea, and re-brew rather than making one strong cup.
• Take the leaf out. Leaving it in the pot is what turns the second cup into something you do not want.

Kinds worth knowing

Sencha

The Japanese everyday tea. Grassy, brisk, a bit of sweetness. The default if a recipe just says Japanese green tea.

Gyokuro

Shade-grown like matcha, so much more savoury and sweet and much less bitter. Brewed very cool — around 50 to 60°C — and worth the fuss.

Genmaicha

Sencha with roasted rice in it. Toasty, forgiving, and the easiest green tea to like.

Hojicha

Roasted green tea. Brown, low in bitterness, almost caramel. Behaves like a black tea in cooking.

Longjing

Pan-fired Chinese. Nutty and clean, with a flat, pressed leaf.

Gunpowder

Rolled into pellets. Strong and slightly smoky; the base of Moroccan mint tea.

Using it in food

Green tea brings vegetal bitterness and a green colour, and both need something to work against.

• As a poaching liquid for white fish or chicken, where it adds a savoury background without adding fat.
• Infused into cream or milk for ice cream, panna cotta and custards. Steep off the heat and strain; boiling it makes it bitter.
• Ground into a salt or a rub, where it does the same job as a dried herb with more bitterness.
• In noodle dough or rice, cooked in brewed tea instead of water — a Japanese habit, and the base of ochazuke.
• For most baking, use matcha instead. Brewed green tea is mostly water and its flavour disappears into a cake; powdered leaf does not.

Why it turns bitter, and how to stop it

• Water that is too hot is the main cause. Green tea wants around 70–80°C, not boiling. Boil the kettle and let it stand for a few minutes, or add a splash of cold water.
• Steeping too long. One to two minutes is usually enough. Green tea extracts fast, and the bitter compounds come out after the sweet ones.
• Too much leaf, which has the same effect as too long.
• Re-steeping is normal — good green tea gives two or three infusions, and the second is often the best.
• Sencha, gyokuro and genmaicha all behave slightly differently: gyokuro in particular wants water as low as 60°C and a longer steep.

Common questions