Posted by NelsonB | Posted in home cooking | Posted on 15-01-2012
Tags: Green tea
I’ve been drinking Japanese green tea for decades. I started drinking tea when my doctor put me on a detox diet where I wasn’t allowed any coffee. To begin with I was concerned that I would be unproductive and sleepy all day without my caffeine boost in the morning. But what I actually found was that my productivity actually increased, I became less jittery and I felt relaxed and centered.
I subsequently learned that the way caffeine in tea affects the body chemistry is different from the way caffeine in coffee does (more on this). In particular it is only released into the bloodstream slowly producing a longer-term stimulation in contrast with the short term coffee high.
So enamored was I with the effects of green tea on my health and well-being that I decided to try to incorporate the leaf into my cooking as well as my drinking rituals. I did some reading and I learned that it’s possible to use green tea as a cooking ingredient in a huge variety of different ways. We really are only limited by our imagination.
But I won’t leave you dangling. I’ll close this article with some insight into how to use green tea in your cooking (and baking).
The easiest way is to take tea leaves that have been steeped and add them freely to your cooking sauces, salads and vegetables. It’s best to use tea leaves that have been steeped just once as they will retain their vegetal fresh flavor. So next time you’re cooking up some pasta or frying some filling for an omelette just stir in some tea leaves from your teapot.
Your next step in the journey of using green tea and cooking is to start to experiment with powdered green tea. You may have come across this as a hot beverage known as “matcha green tea”. This is widely drunk in Japan and is the type of tea used in the most traditional Japanese tea ceremonies. Matcha is made by grinding fresh tea leaves between 2 rotating stones so that a powder is produced.
I’ve been experimenting with matcha spreads such as butter and cream cheese and it tastes brilliant. I’ve even started sprinkling the green tea powder into bread and pasta dough. And of course green tea ice cream is the perfect end to any meal.

