When Green Tea is more than just tea!

Shizuoka Prefecture is famous for green tea, producing about 40% of the green tea in Japan. And so, many places offer several products including the “green gold”. This time, I got to try green tea goodies from Makinohara City, located in the southwest of the prefecture at Suruga Bay. The city not only has pretty beaches but also mountains rising. And for sure, a lot of green tea plantations!

Talking about green tea from Makinohara, the place to be is Grinpia Makinohara, which I really want to visit someday, because there you can learn about green tea production and join a green tea picking experience as well. And for sure, you can taste and purchase green tea products there.

When the goodies arrived, unfortunately, I had been in the hospital with a broken fibula, so I had to wait for some time until I could finally try them. However, so I had something nice waiting for me at home when I was finally allowed to leave the hospital.

First, we got a pack of Shizuoka Makinohara Sencha (静岡牧之原煎茶), a rich, deep-steamed tea, that you can enjoy either hot or cold. As it is still winter and cold, for sure, we went for the hot version. As it comes in tea bags already, it is very easy to serve the tea. We decided not to let the tea bag in for too long, so that the taste is not getting too strong (and so you can easily use it twice). The flavor was nice and rich – and I really felt I needed something sweet with it.

We tried the tea together with some matcha sweets that came in a beautiful package. The black box with the wrapping made it look very elegant and fancy - and I was excited to open the box. Inside were 8 single wrapped sweets called Shizuoka Matcha Leaf Pie (静岡抹茶リーフパイ). And yes, they look as they are named: like leaves, coming directly from the green tea plants.

The main pie is very crunchy and delicious. In the middle, you can find a green tea filling, made from high-grade aromatic matcha. I really enjoyed the leaf pie and was about to eat another one right away.

The third part of the goodie set is the Shizuoka Matcha Mitsu (静岡抹茶みつ), a matcha syrup with honey. I already love the design of the bottle, with the large green tea plantations with Mount Fuji in the background, and an idea of how to use the syrup at the front.

There are several options to use the syrup, like adding it to traditional desserts like anmitsu, on ice cream, on your toast or inside a drink. I decided to enjoy my morning pancakes with it – and it tasted really good. Because of the honey, it is quite sweet, but perfectly goes along with my combination of pancakes and blueberries. I will definitely eat it this way again.

Japanese people enjoy traveling for food – and I can relate to this. Trying all these delicious green tea goodies from Makinohara, now makes me want to go there to get even more!

This post is supported by Makinohara City, one of City-Cost's Supporters helping City-Cost bloggers to enjoy life in Japan and engage in new experiences.