Everyone has a food or drink that they turn to for comfort. Something which warms you inside and makes you feel feel cozy and safe. Something simple but which satisfies you perfectly and brings back fond memories. It might be a chicken soup your mother made for you when you were ill, a cup of cocoa with marshmallows you had on snowy days, or the hamburgers your father grilled on summer evenings.
My personal comfort drink is a large glass of hot genmaicha, a Japanese green tea blended with crisply-roasted rice. It brings back the memory of my first tea house experience decades ago. It was one of those doily-and-knick-knacks places where the walls were pink, the tea menu several pages long, and three-tier trays of sweets and finger sandwiches sat center on every table. In those early days loose-leaf tea seemed extremely upper-crust, and the menu was daunting. Genmaicha caught my eye with the mention of roasted rice, which seemed an extremely novel and exotic combination. When the tea arrived at the table I was immediately taken with the friendly, savory taste - it was love at first sip.
Since then whenever I have been particularly stressed or needed an emotional pick-me-up I have turned to genmaicha. It has never failed to bring me that feeling of cuddling up under a blanket with a good book on a rainy day. Although my regular tea tastes these days trend more toward rarer teas, I aways have a stock of genmaicha on hand.
What is Genmaicha?
Although genmaicha is a staple among Japanese tea vendors, there are actually a number of different varieties. The standard genmaicha is simply basic green tea like bancha to which has been added some rice roasted to a crisp toasty brown. Some genmaicha is made with a common or mid-grade sencha, or has a few rice kernels that have exploded like tiny bits popcorn. Genmaicha can even be made with more exotic styles of green tea, such as karigane twig tea, or high-end gyokuro. Very rarely, toasted rice is added to types of teas other than green, although they tend not to be labelled as genmaicha.
There is also a variety of genmaicha that has also been dusted with matcha powder. This gives a very bright green color to an otherwise yellowish tea, and a strong matcha taste that can be a bit bitter. The matcha tends to wash away with the first infusion, leaving only a faint taste in a second or third infusion. Adding matcha seems to be an effort to make a common tea more novel and impressive, but it can detract from the friendly, comforting nature of standard genmaicha. Still, it is a popular variation that has a strong base of supporters and well worth a try.
The irony of matcha genmaicha is that it elevates genmaicha into an elegant tea suitable for formal occasions, but this tea started out with very humble beginnings.
How this Classic Blend Came to Be.
Adding rice to tea was created out of necessity, rather than as a new product line for tea shop shelves. While tea has long been a household staple in Japan, not all households could always afford their daily tea. Rice was added as a filler, stretching the more expensive tea leaf as far as it could go. A month’s supply of tea could last three months or more with this method.
It proved to be a very popular poor-mans drink, a useful life hack during trying times. However as genmaicha is also extremely tasty it was not long before it was widely adopted as a standard tea variety in households of all means. Although it’s still not regarded as a peer among the elite teas of Japan, its ubiquitous place in Japanese tea shops speaks to its enduring and widespread popularity.
There is one downside to adding rice to tea worth noting. Tea leaf itself never truly goes bad, it just fades in flavor until stale. However rice is not as durable. If stored for too long on your shelf, the oils in the rice can go rancid. This does not happen rapidly, usually taking more than a year, and you are likely to finish your genmaicha long before it happens. However it’s worth taking a sniff of your tea leaf before brewing.
How to Brew Your Genmaicha
Brewing genmaicha isn’t difficult, but there is a slight trick to it. To get the most flavor and aroma out of the roasted rice you need hotter water. However the green tea base is usually delicate enough that you would normally brew it with colder water to avoid bitterness. How do you get full rice flavor without over-brewing the green tea leaf into unpleasant astringency?
Fortunately an easy method is to brew with very hot water, say 195-200°F, but keep the steeping time short. A small teapot of genmaicha might only infuse for 20-30 seconds. Later infusions would brew for longer to retain the full flavor. The hot water quickly extracts the rice flavor, and the shorter steeping time limits the bitterness.
Fortunately the rich rice taste tends to balance out any remaining bitterness, but if you still find it a bit too sharp try lowering the temperature and lengthen the steeping. This usually mutes the rice flavor and increases the dominance of the tea leaf, but this may be exactly the outcome you prefer.
After two or three infusions the rice flavors are usually played out and your session is done, but occasionally you will find your genmaicha providing good flavor for an additional infusion or two beyond that.
Brewing matcha genmaicha is a nearly identical process, although you may wish to start with an initial infusion at a lower temperature to avoid sharpness from the matcha powder. However, once most of the matcha is drunk in the first infusion, later steepings can be made with hotter water without worry.
Regardless of the brewing style make sure you use plenty of tea leaf. The rice takes up some bulk so you may need to use an additional scoop or two to get tea as intense as you are used to. As always, adjust the levels of leaf, time, and temperature as you see fit to get the results that please you best. Tea is a personal experience, and should always be made to suit your own tastes. That is particularly true of your personal comfort tea.
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