Gaiwan for gyokuro?

[Rainy-Day]

I've ordered first gyokuro (kame from ocha), but I don't have a houhin and my only kyusu is about 11oz. However, I do have a gaiwan that's about 3.5oz. Looking at houhins, I see that they're glazed on the inside.. it seems like two glazed tea brewing implements of about the same size and bulk should work in a similar way..? Or am I way off here? I know that a gaiwan won't filter the leaves out as well as a houhin, but it happens so that I like sencha that's not filtered - I removed metal screen from kyusu and I pour slowly (works very well for me even with fukamushi)!

A related question is, since ~3.5oz is the recommended size for gyokuro, and all the good shops like ocha, zencha, hibiki-an, yuukicha sell gyokuro and they have tons of pots of size suitable for sencha, but next to nothing of the size for gyokuro - the traditional way is to get a houhin? But even houhins are more like 5oz+ rather than 3.5oz?

[Chip]

Houjins can be any size. Looking at the shelves here, I see one holds less than 2 ounces and one would hold 5ish. Most are 3-4 ounces. I have seen bigger though!

A gainwan will work OK. The Kame should brew up pretty good in one.

I wold think the main reason you see less houjins from shops is because they sell a LOT more sencha than gyo.

Let us know how you like the Kame! That is some really good Gyo, your first one?

[alan logan]

hi,

using a gaiwan is no problem (to filter better you adjust the lid close to walls ; to pour more thoroughly you can turn the gaiwan one side and the other).
(plus, on maiko's site there is a page about susuricha, don't miss it !)

a seemingly too big vessel with green tea (japanese or chinese) is no problem either, you don't fill the vessel to the rim when brewing, so you can make 100ml of tea in a 250ml pot eg -you don't need to use the whole capacity of the vessel.

[debunix]

Gaiwans work fine for gyokuro as well as for sencha, but can get a little messy or slow on the pouring, depending on how much you let through, which is why I ended up buying a kyusu.

[Rainy-Day]

Alan: great! That susuri looks exactly like a gaiwan that was squashed a bit. Is it thinner than a typical gaiwan though?

Chip: Yes, my first gyokuro ever! I thought I'd have to buy an expensive one and a good houhin so I held off for a year and a half, but once I started looking I've read here that o-cha's kame is highly recommended, and I figured either my gaiwan or kyusu will work in a pinch!

Will definitely post my thoughts. I don't have the tea yet, but I think I should get it today or tomorrow.

I'm also getting a proper matcha bowl from them, and chiyo mukashi matcha. Before that I was buying kiku mukashi and using a large ceramic bowl that's shaped sort of like matcha bowl but is about twice bigger and I suspect alot thicker. Sometimes I'd make pretty good matcha but it was very inconsistent. I always preheat the bowl and sift, but I don't wipe the bowl dry after preheating. I hope to get better results with real matcha bowl and chiyo.. although I've been thinking that matcha is just not my cup, since I'm a fan of subtle, lightly brewed teas, like sencha or a good dragonwell or something like that.

I'll soon post my experience with matcha, too!

[Rainy-Day]

Debunix: great! This gives me an idea to use my gaiwan for sencha, too. I never tried that. I prefer to do one infusion for sencha but sometimes I want to experiment with more leaf and infusions and my kyusu's a bit too large for that.

So, another unix fan or I am misreading your name?

[debunix]

First login was for a course in unix so initials plus unix = debunix.

Today I just remember enough to navigate among directories a bit, ls, and rm, and that's about it!

I used my gaiwans for a comparison brewing of 2 of my shinchas a few weeks ago, because I don't have identical kyusus, and it worked ok, but I had to pull out my tea strainer for the first time in a while, and gave thanks for the kyusu when brewing one of them solo the next morning.

[alan logan]

Alan: great! That susuri looks exactly like a gaiwan that was squashed a bit. Is it thinner than a typical gaiwan though?

well I could not say. there is no "typical" thinness for gaiwans, you can find very thin ones or thicker ones (celadon tends to be thicker, and thinner ones tend to be porcelain ; but you also find thicker porcelain ones...)

thinness is more convenient for adjusting the lid easily, but a thick-walled gaiwan will be just as fine. thin or thick does not per se influence the tea, generally it is an esthetic choice (I also heard that only quality material could serve to make thin walls --which would not mean that as a buyer you can correlate walls/quality ; about that a ceramist would be able to say better than I).

[Rainy-Day]

In my experience, thickness does affect tea. For example, thick ceramic pots are not very good for chinese greens, thinner kyusu are better and thinnest glass is best. I think chinese greens don't like high heat retention, while sencha is more tolerant of it, so to get a kyusu working well for a chinese greens I had great results with opening the lid a bid while brewing. The gaiwan I have, as well as other gaiwans I've seen all have pretty thick walls... actually now that I'm thinking back that's not true, I had one possibly porcelain one with thinner walls. I might still have it, I'll have to check! Even if I do have it, I wonder if I have the lid for it.. I know that out of three gaiwans I have (not counting glass one I use as a cup), one has a missing lid but I don't remember which one.

[alan logan]

In my experience, thickness does affect tea. For example, thick ceramic pots are not very good for chinese greens, thinner kyusu are better and thinnest glass is best. I think chinese greens don't like high heat retention, while sencha is more tolerant of it, so to get a kyusu working well for a chinese greens I had great results with opening the lid a bid while brewing.

would not that seem a question of conductivity of material ? ceramic materials conducts heat well, so whatever thickness of walls your tea may be "cooked" in a ceramic pot. Now thick walls of a ceramic pot are usually thicker than thick walls of a gaiwan, and at some point of "thickness" yes, that could interfere. but then nature of the ceramic material plays its part to greater extent.
As for gaiwan, the difference in thickness between a "thin g." and a "thick g." is not more than one or one and a half mm or so ; given so little difference I would think you are safe in case you use your thick gaiwan.

if you brew green chinese tea in a pot, the cooking effect will happen much more likely if you close the lid (due to the shape) with a brew longer than 1mn ; so either you brew without the lid as you point out, or you fill the pot only halfway. the liquor in the making needs some "aerating" (which is here with a gaiwan due to its shape).
with a thin ceramic pot filled to the rim + lid closed + long brew, cooking effect is very likely to happen too.

chinese green you usually brew with longer time than sencha, I think that is why you feel they are less tolerant to heat retention : within sencha brewing times, the retention does not have the time to impact. But I would not assert that no chinese greens were particularly sensitive, of course (there are many many ways of processing so they are far from equivalent in their reactions).