Houjicha is smooth and mellow roasted nut flavor, which lingers nicely for a while. We would like you to rediscover the value of our Houjicha items for monthly recommendation.

The first three processing steps of Houjicha tea leaves are the same as for Sencha: 1) Steaming, 2) Drying and Crumpling, and 3) Shaping. But to make Houjicha, the tea goes through one special additional step: 4) Roasting. The smooth and mellow roasted aroma of Houjicha is created by roasted.
Like Sencha, tea leaves for Houjicha are grown with fully-flooded sunlight, so that Houjicha contains beneficial Catechin. And since Houjicha is pan-roasted, it is very low in caffeine. In Japan, Houjicha is commonly given to babies and people who are sick because it is both nourishing and low in caffeine. Besides, Houjicha is perfect for iced tea. It will cool you on a sizzling hot day.

Hibiki-an uses only the highest grade (first harvested, or pruned after harvesting Shincha) tea leaves to make all of our Houjicha items. The finished product is a fresh roasted chestnut-brown color. The leaves are only lightly roasted to maximize the essential flavor of the tea leaves. The flavor is very smooth and the aroma lingers nicely for a while.

Unfortunately many tea companies use low grade tea leaves (second harvested, third harvested, pruned in autumn, etc.) to make their Houjicha. Other Houjicha (not ours!) is roasted too strongly and becomes a dark brown color, so the flavor is smoky and not smooth at all.

Also Houjicha items are all good affordable everyday tea and are favorite beverage of tea farmers all over Japan. Like "fresh roasted" coffee, Houjicha is also most flavorful just after roasting. Needless to say, all of our Houjicha items at Hibiki-an are fresh roasted, packaged just after roasting.