Tea tasting: Ise Shouseikan (Jikonka)

Chinese tea drinkers would know this type of tea, known as ‘xiao qing gan’ (literally, little green citrus) in Mandarin. It’s made with tea leaves stuffed in little tangerine, and usually involves pu’er tea.

I read somewhere before that ‘xiao qing gan’ is really equivalent to pu’er tea stuffed in tangerine, and any other tea used will not be a ‘xiao qing gan’. I’m not sure about how strict that rule is, but of course this tea I’m talking about today is not pu’er tea from China.

This is an experimental version of ‘xiao qing gan’, made in Mie prefecture where the tea produced is branded as Ise-cha hence Ise Shouseikan (the Japanese reading of ‘xiao qing gan’).

The maker of this tea Jikonka is a food brand using ingredients from Mie prefecture, which happens to be a major tea-producing region. Black tea varieties are grown in the mountains of Kameyama City and have their roots in Taiwanese mountain tea. These tea plants are managed through natural cultivation to produce white tea and black tea.

The inspiration to make Ise Shouseikan came about when Jikonka founders first discovered ‘xiao qing gan’ at a tea industry facility in Hangzhou, China, and decided that they also wanted to make such tea in Japan. Realising that Mie has a lot of citrus production, they thought it would be great to use local materials in producing something that is unique to Japan.

Local aged black tea is used, stuffed into yuzu fruits that were picked while still green, then roasted and dried. After some years of trial and error, Ise Shouseikan came to fruition. The materials used are naturally produced without pesticides or chemical fertilisers.

This particular batch is made with yuzu and oxidised tea produced in 2020, if I didn’t take note wrongly. It came in a fancy little box, containing three balls of Ise Shouseikan. Each citrus ball weighs about 8g, minus the wrapping.

The recommended brewing method is to break the ball up while it’s still in its wrapping before putting it into a pre-warmed teapot or other brewing vessel. But before I broke it up, I thought it would look nice in a Chinese gaiwan.

Well, didn’t get the effect that I was looking for, as the yuzu ball tipped over in the water and floated around instead of staying under water. LOL.

The yuzu aroma was very apparent even before brewing, and I really loved it.

Anyway, I used a kyusu teapot instead after that as I broke the ball up. Steeped in 200ml of boiled water for 30 seconds. The resulting tea liquor was dark amber with a strong citrus fragrance. Taste-wise, it was sweet, like regular black tea, with very little astringency. Usually tea steeped in boiled water would tend to be slightly bitter or astringent but not with this Shouseikan.

Because of the generous amount of tea leaves packed into a tiny yuzu ball, this tea could really be steeped for many times without losing its flavour. The citrus note in the taste was very prominent by the 3rd steeping, right to the 6th steeping. All in all, I managed to get flavourful steepings up to 8 times. By then the yuzu peel was already disintegrating.

Come to think of it, I’m not quite sure when exactly had I bought this tea. I just kind of have a notion that I got it in late 2022. It’s one of those teas that I have stored for months or more since I first purchased it. A belated thought hit me… I think next time I should write on the packages the dates I bought the teas if I intend to store or age them. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be sure of how long I’ve actually aged them and I would think this is crucial information for reviews. Can’t do much about what I have in stock already (which is roughly about 10 black and dark teas). Heh.

However, got to put aside all those teas for the timebeing as it’s the shincha season! I’ve placed my orders for a couple of shincha, which should arrive by end of the month. Can’t wait!