Fukamushi Kikugawa tea

The raw leaves for Fukamushi Kikugawacha come from Kikugawa City, with specified tea gardens in Makinohara, Kakegawa, Shimada, and Omaezaki also part of the production area. Kikugawa and nearby tea districts are warmer and sunnier than other tea areas. Under those conditions, leaves grow thick, catechin content rises, and a stronger astringency appears. The place gives the tea its first practical problem: a firm leaf with a sharper bite.

At the start of aracha processing, fresh leaves meet steam. For Fukamushi Kikugawacha, that steam goes deeper than in ordinary sencha and takes more than twice as long. The method fits Kikugawa’s thick leaves: long steaming suppresses the components behind astringency, mellows the taste, and can create fine particles that help deepen the green color. The cup begins with this practical adjustment to the leaf itself.

After the steam, the leaves move through rough rolling, rolling, middle rolling, final rolling, and drying, becoming aracha. That aracha is then finished in Shizuoka facilities with the techniques and equipment used for Fukamushi Kikugawacha. The path runs from tea gardens around Kikugawa to steam, rolling, drying, and final finishing, so leaf origin and workshop process remain connected in the finished tea.

The thick leaves of Kikugawa and nearby areas were once handled in Japan as middle-grade tea because their astringency was strong. Around 1952, local research found that steaming the leaves longer reduced that sharpness and made the tea taste better. With technical improvement and volume production organized through the tea industry, deep-steamed tea spread more widely in Japan, and Kikugawa became closely associated with the development of the style.

The tea fields around Kikugawa also carry chagusaba practice, continued for more than 100 years in the area. Farmers cut grasses such as susuki from semi-natural grasslands and lay them in tea gardens as organic matter. The field-level details are concrete: grasslands near the tea gardens, cut susuki, grass laid back between rows, and repeated work connected with the scenery and biodiversity around Kikugawa.

In the cup, Fukamushi Kikugawacha is described as a green tea with dense yellow-green liquor and mellow taste, along with rich aroma, umami, and body. The Kikugawa tea association also emphasizes deep green color, refined flavor, and a slight tendency toward fine particles as part of the tea’s character. Those sensory traits point back to thick leaves, longer steaming, aracha processing, and Shizuoka finishing.