I'm not familiar with the way Hibiki-an markets their products, but to apply your reasoning to Thes du Japon, may be totally incorrect. They don't call their early released gyokuro 'shincha gyokuro'. And they make it a point to describe the full gyokuro processing in the case of this tea that I mentioned.daidokorocha wrote:People really need to stop coming up with new names for things. Shincha gyokuro? I googled this figuring what it was and I have no idea why hibiki-an is peddling their tea with this ridiculous name. Gyokuro by no means has to be stored and what they are peddling as "shincha gyokuro" is merely kabusecha. It almost seems like a marketing scam to me. Hibiki-an basically outs themselves on their page for kuradashi tea, showing that gyokuro isn't often aged. http://www.hibiki-an.com/contents.php/cnID/7victoria3 wrote:Interesting, I thought Gyokuro was stored for +-4 months, to let it sit and mellow out, and then only sold in September October. Or is this a Sincha Gyokuro? i.e. Shaded Sincha.Tead Off wrote:Interesting. I never would have thought of using that pot for gyokuro, but why not!JRS22 wrote:This morning I'm drinking the last of my O-Cha Gyokuro Uji Gyoko-Hou. There was just a little bit left so I brewed it in my tiny appaloosa Kim Eung Chul pot. I've always thought of this unglazed porcelain pot as best for yancha, possibly because of the size, but I'm very pleased at how well the gyokuro turned out.
I've been drinking Thes du Japon gyokuro from Hoshino village, Yame. It is a Yamakai cultivar. To my great surprise it is a May, 2016 picking. Well worth trying. Smooth, tasty, with no shincha astringency.
They state that basically no one does this (except them of course!). And yet, for some reason on their "shincha gyokuro" page they say that this is a way you can enjoy gyokuro now without having to wait, despite the fact that almost all of their gyokuro on their website is not kuradashi. Though, I'm not sure how much one can say that "no one else does this" considering one of the most popular brands of bottled green tea in Japan released a kuradashi version a few years back. Again, it all seems too much like marketing.
I first noticed the use of shincha gyokuro last year. Being someone who doesn't really care for most shincha sencha, I might think that 'new' gyokuro would also have some of that astringency that appears in normal shincha. But, that doesn't seem to be the case in the tea that I bought which is really quite good. Brewed correctly, it is refined, mellow, sweet and delicious. A real treat for gyokuro lovers. It is not a particularly deep, umami rich gyokuro, but very satisfying.