Matcha and sencha in the same day? Why not? And now I'll have some oolong too I think. I live dangerously!
Now there is something I need to talk about. When I got this chawan, about a month ago, a few people said it was too small to whisk usucha and that I'd need a picnic-sized "nodate chasen" to do it right. Not knowing jack about matcha I searched the earth high and low and found at last the elusive nodate chasen shown here.
But, you know what? It's really not better at all... in fact, it makes a much less frothy cloud than the big one. I have three theories on this:
1) More prongs means more air bubbles hence bigger is better even if the movement is a little constrained.
2) My big chasen was bought from a Japanese matcha company and it's supposedly high quality. The nodate is cheap, it was the only one I could find ... so maybe it's quality?
3) Maybe I need to se it in a different way to get the most out of it-- is there a different way to whisk with the nodate chasen?
I don't know. Well, I'm just glad I have learned to whisk with the big one even though it's small bowl (I really like the size it feel so nice in my hands ...like it was made just for me
Well, I'm not a very big person
)
YUM!
One thing that I observed was that the prongs of the nodate were curly when I first got it but when I rinsed it for the first time the uncurled and they have not gone back, in contrast to this the large chasen was not curled when I got it... is that significant?
I was a little disappointed because I thought the little curls would make lot fo bubbles but apparently this uncurling is "normal" -- for some chasen.
Last, I have had problems with the matcha sticking to the bottom of the chashaku, to solve this I sanded it with 600 then 800 the 1200 sandpaper-- this worked like a charm!
Sanded with 1200 grain paper, no more sticking! It feels like silk to the touch.
