Apple Matcha

OK… I couldn’t wait to try another of the trio of matcha teas from 52Teas.

I like this one a lot. The apple flavor sort of melds in with the flavor of the matcha to make it an almost a seamless flavor. This doesn’t taste like apple flavored matcha… it tastes like “apple matcha” – if that makes sense.

I like it a lot. I think the next time I have some, I might try it with a little cinnamon and nutmeg and have my own version of apple pie matcha.

Yum.

It took forever, but finally trying the last 52teas matcha!

Whoa, there are a lot of very large clumps in this one- I hope it whisks well. The dry powder definitely smells like matcha and apple.

Same ratio as the other 2: 3 scoops/8oz water.

Hmmm… the flavor is almost completely matcha- there is a faint appleish sweetness, but I think it’s so faint I wouldn’t be able to point it out if I didn’t know it was there… I’m not getting the apple matcha LiberTEAS did and that makes me sad.

Winner for personal preference goes to cranberry, and accurracy goes to banana. What’s next Frank?

I’ve noticed that this matcha blend has lots of lumps in it – hard lumps too, I had to apply a considerable amount of pressure with my fingers to break them up. I wonder if that’s the blending process or if that’s the fault of the matcha base itself?

Anyways, I used approximately 1 tsp of matcha in 8oz of hot water. It’s a touch on the watery side still, but managed to get good matcha flavour. However the apple is harder to find and honestly, if I didn’t know that it was supposed to be apple-flavoured I would have taken it for plain matcha. There’s a little bit of flavour in the aftertaste, but it’s faint. Maybe next time I’ll try with less water and maybe a lower temperature.

I definitely over-hyped the apple and cranberry matchas for myself, and I’m worrying that goes for all the 52 Teas teas I bought! I’m regretting spending so much on these two.

The matcha powder looked pretty dull and murky and I didn’t get any scent from it apart from the powdery matcha smell. This translated into the liquid. Very murky-looking. I tried not to let this determine how I felt about it, but I couldn’t sense any apple in it when I started sipping. I finished the chawan with still little taste of any sort, let alone that of apple.

There are also large chunks in the package and many smaller ones that are so hard they don’t seem to want to break up. This definitely needs sifting, but there were a lot of grains of it that I couldn’t break up and just discarded.

I don’t know if this matcha is kind of old at this point or if my palate is not sharp enough or what, but it was just like drinking largely tasteless green chalky powder. Not horrible, but not enjoyable.

I’m not sure matcha and I get along. Not because of the taste, but because of the texture. I’m getting better at it though, because this one is much less grainy than my other attempts.

~1/4 teaspoon matcha to ~8 oz water. Made a paste of the powder with a bit of water, mashed and got the clumps out. Added more water and whisked with the bamboo whisk (chasen?) that I bought. And now I’m sipping and then stirring the bejeebus out of it with a spoon between sips.

Love the taste, I really do love the taste of this. It’s got a good apple flavor, not too sour and not too sweet. Texture is better than my prior attempts (probably because of the constant stirring with my spoon). I’m not sure that my normal tea drinking rituals work with matcha (slowly sipping a cup whilst going about my day), since the matcha tends to settle.

That being said, I’m still making myself another cup. ’Cause this is tasty!!!