12.14.04
Green Tea & Caffeine
Question of the day: “Hi, I love green tea and only buy it in “decaf” tea bag form. Do you offer decaf?”
We don’t offer caffeine free green tea. We do, however, offer a good solution for that. Before I get into what the solution is, I’d like to explain why we don’t carry decaf green tea.
Basically, green tea is picked and then process immediately to prevent oxidation of the leaves. The whole process of steaming, rolling, and drying takes about three hours start to finish. There really is no place in the process of processing where a decaffeination process would work and not ruin the tea. I know- you can buy decaf “green tea” in the grocery store, but I’ve never tried one that was good, or green. Decaf green tea is just about unheard of in Japan. We’ve not aware of any company here that even offers it.
The solution? Instead of purchasing supposed “decaf green tea”, your best bet is to find a really high quality green tea, brew it, dump it, and then re-brew. Nearly all of the caffeine in green tea is in the first infusion. As much of a shame as it seems to be to dump the first infusion (which has the most taste and best aroma), I have no doubt that the second infusion of a high quality green tea is better than the best “decaf green tea” in the grocery store.
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Walker said,
March 8, 2005 at 8:58 pm
your best bet is to find a really high quality green tea, brew it, dump it, and then re-brew. Nearly all of the caffeine in green tea is in the first infusion. As much of a shame as it seems to be to dump the first infusion (which has the most taste and best aroma)
That’s curious! This is exactly what I’ve been doing when I have green tea, but not in an attempt to rid it of caffeine. I find that the first infusion of green tea is bitter and unpleasant to taste (perhaps the aroma is ok), and have been dumping the first infusion (just about 15-20 seconds worth) in order to make it palatable. This is with cheap American green tea bags, as are available for us at work.
Kevin said,
March 8, 2005 at 9:53 pm
Usually when your tea ends up being too bitter after the brew, it means the temperature was too high and or you brewed it too long. Should be about 175 degrees F (70C) or so. Then again, it could be the tea as well….
Jason Truesdell said,
April 6, 2005 at 7:44 pm
You can also drink a lower-caffeine green tea, like kukicha (though the flavor is not the same as sencha).
Green tea usually has a lower caffeine content than other teas because it is generally infused very briefly.