Maybe you've seen it in a latte at your local café, or spotted the vivid green powder tucked
into a recipe somewhere. Matcha has a way of catching your attention. But beyond the color
— that quiet, almost mossy green — what actually is it?
If you've been curious but not quite sure where to start, this is for you.
It Starts With a Single Plant
All tea — green, black, white, oolong — comes from the same plant: Camellia sinensis.
What makes each type distinct is how the leaves are grown, harvested, and processed.
Matcha is a type of green tea, but the similarities with your average green tea bag end fairly
quickly. The journey from plant to cup is deliberate, unhurried, and deeply intentional —
which is part of why the result tastes so different.
How Matcha Is Made
Shade Growing
About three to four weeks before harvest, matcha tea plants are covered — traditionally with
bamboo mats or cloth canopies, today sometimes with shade screens. This blocks most of
the sunlight and triggers something interesting in the plant.
Deprived of direct light, the leaves slow down and work harder to photosynthesize with
whatever light they can find. This causes them to produce more chlorophyll (which deepens
the green color) and more L-theanine, an amino acid that contributes to matcha's
characteristic calm, focused energy. The flavor shifts too — less astringent, more savory
and sweet, with that distinctive umami quality that good matcha is known for.
Harvest and Processing
After shading, only the youngest, most tender leaves are hand-picked. These are steamed
quickly to stop oxidation, then dried. At this stage, the leaves become what's called tencha
— the raw material for matcha.
The stems and veins are removed, and what remains is slowly stone-ground into a fine
powder. This is not a fast process. Traditional stone mills grind slowly — sometimes
producing as little as 30 to 40 grams of matcha per hour — to keep the temperature low and
preserve the delicate compounds in the leaf. The result is a powder so fine it feels like silk
between your fingers.