Iribancha

Not for the faint of heart. Iribancha is a traditional Japanese specialty tea from the Kyoto region. It is VERY heavily smoked, with an intense “smokey/burned” smell reminiscent almost of cigarettes.

I’d say it’s an acquired taste that definitely grows on you over time. I used this as a daily drinker for a couple of weeks and definitely grew to appreciate it more over that time.

I will note that transporting this tea is pretty tricky, because it has an extremely smokey aroma that is not really contained by the paper-based bag it’s sold in. Expect your whole luggage to smell like it’s been in a smoker’s house. (I will say that the smell doesn’t stay and just airing out your luggage for a bit will be fine).

A single ziplock bag is insufficient to contain the smell of this tea. I currently have this stored in a ziplock bag within a large airtight Ikea plastic container. Even then, my cupboard smelled like this tea for about a week before the smell fully dissipated.

I picked up a pouch of this in one-pot teabags to accompany my pretty new Ippodo glass carafe. I’ve been cold brewing constantly lately so they got me good when they sent an email advertising it… :P

The carafe itself is lovely, but holy shit is this tea smoky! I was quite taken aback because the only Kyobancha I’ve had is Obubu’s, and it’s completely different from this version. This is Lapsang-level smoky, like sitting next to a campfire with the smoke drifting directly into your face. I’m not able to taste the more nuanced notes of the roast well at all because the smokiness is so intense.

Maybe next time I’ll try a shorter steep or just one teabag per liter… o.o

The tea has a rather smokey aroma and this also reflects in the taste. The bitterness of the tea leaves and the bitter scent of the smoked aroma collaborate nicely to imbue the tea with a strong refreshing, thirst quenching and revitalising character. A hint of acidity can also be derived, but isn’t at all overpowering. The overall aroma of the tea quickly fades and doesn’t linger in the mouth. It’s liquor is dark brown with a dark red distinction. Visually, it appears somewhat close to the liquor of a black tea.
Overall, it is a fairly easy tea to enjoy and easy to brew. It is a great thirst quencher and allows itself to be infused in large quantities at a time, making it a great tea to drink throughout the day. As the amount of caffeine contained is also neither to low, Kyo-Bancha can be consumed at basically any time of the day and by any person ranging from very young to old.