Matcha

Matcha is a Japanese powdered green tea made by stone-grinding whole, shade-grown tea leaves, called tencha once de-veined and dried, into a fine bright-green powder, whisked directly into hot water with a bamboo whisk rather than steeped and strained. The powdered-tea technique itself originated in Song dynasty China, where tea leaves were steamed, dried, ground and whisked to raise a foam; the Japanese tradition began in 1191 CE when the Zen Buddhist monk Eisai returned from study in Song China bringing tea seeds and the whisked powdered-tea method, planting them in Kyushu and later Uji, and writing Kissa Yojoki, Japan's first tea treatise. The practice developed into the formal Japanese tea ceremony over the following centuries, reaching its classical codified form under tea master Sen no Rikyu in the sixteenth century. It is prepared in two traditional styles, usucha, a lighter everyday preparation, and koicha, a denser, syrup-like preparation reserved for formal tea ceremony use.