THIS IS A PREORDER ITEM - this item will be available for shipment or collection from the teahouse towards the end of March. We are currently placing a limit of a maximum of 1 unit of Mokuren per person. If you order more than 1, the extra charge will be refunded minus a £5 administration fee.

Stone ground first harvest tencha. Specially crafted for mixing with milk/alternate milk of your choice (we recommend Bonsoy), and you can also use it for making sweets. It is so good that it can also be made just with water alone. Higher grade matcha doesn’t taste as nice as with milk as the delicate flavours will be overpowered.

If you would like to enjoy the flavour of the tea itself alone, try preparing it with water at a ratio of 2g : 80ml, either hot or iced. We are proud to be able to say that the natural sweetness and nutty umami still shine through, with a smooth bitterness that is not harsh or unpleasant! This is extremely rare for a matcha that also pairs so well with milk and in bakes, and to us Mokuren represents something akin to a ‘Goldilocks’ matcha where the flavour profile is ‘just right’ to be prepared with water alone, in an unsweetened latte, a sweetened latte, and bakes. 

Try Ike no Shiro if you are looking for a matcha to enjoy as usucha, or Seiju/Houju if you are looking to prepare matcha as koicha or usucha.

Tasting notes: Nutty, chocolatey, sweet, smooth bitterness, clean umami.

Read about our recipe for creating a delicious iced matcha soy and our blogpost about how to choose matcha

Region: Hoshinomura, Yame, Fukuoka

Small tip: Remember to always sift matcha before preparation! Here is our recommended matcha tea strainer.

About Matcha Freshness:

Mokuren’s tea producer suggest to enjoy usucha and koicha grade matcha within 7 months from being stone ground. Other quality tea producers suggest 6 months, some suggest 8 months. In our opinion, any use by date longer than 9 months is a sign that the seller doesn’t care much about freshness of matcha - a non oxidised tea with particle sizes of 6-8 microns. As we push towards increasing the transparency from the origin of the tea all the way to the final consumer, we are adding the stone grind date to all matcha purchased from us along with a suggested use by date (unopened). We challenge everyone looking to buy matcha to enquire about the grind date for the matcha you are buying, and we challenge all matcha sellers to provide this date as it is the only date that matters concerning the freshness of the tea before it is opened.

Once opened, high quality matcha’s freshness is best enjoyed within 4 weeks. Again, some tea producers suggest less, and others are more lenient. We want the final consumer of the tea to have the essential information (stone grind date and open date) to be able to keep track of when the matcha was ground and when it was opened, to decide for themselves how strict/lenient to be. To encourage this, there will also be a small space on the matcha pack/can for you to write the date you open the matcha. We want you to see if you notice the flavour change over time, and come to your own conclusions about how important freshness is!

We know that while the tea is safe to consume for much longer than 6-8 months after grinding, it is a target to set that allows the bright vivid flavours to still be enjoyed. The longer the matcha sits unopened the more dull the flavours will become. Fridge storage will help to delay the flavour degradation, and for room temperature storage we would recommend to use within 3-6 months. We don’t have much experience with freezing matcha but if you would like to, it is a good idea to refrigerate for one day before freezing and again after removing from the freezer (and then place in room temperature for a few hours before opening) to slow the temperature changes.