Shimizu Tani Garden: The Story Behind Our Organic Matcha
Updated: May 2026
Most matcha sold in the UK has limited provenance information attached to it. It comes from Japan — usually — but beyond that, the origin story tends to be vague. Our ceremonial matcha is different. It comes from a single garden: the Shimizu Tani plantation in the Uji city prefecture of Kyoto, a site with a cultivation history dating back to the seventeenth century and one of the earliest adopters of organic growing methods in the region.
Why Kyoto and why Uji
Kyoto is the spiritual home of matcha. The city's long association with Buddhist ceremony, the formal tea tradition and centuries of careful cultivation practice have made it the benchmark against which all other matcha is measured. Within Kyoto, the Uji area is particularly prized — the microclimate, the quality of the water and the long-established knowledge of shade-growing techniques all contribute to a matcha with exceptional depth of flavour and vivid colour.
Shimizu Tani translates as Clear Water Ravine — a name that reflects both the geography of the site and the quality of the growing environment. The plantation covers around thirty acres and converted to organic growing methods in 1980, well ahead of most producers in the region. That early commitment to organic practice is part of what makes the garden's matcha distinctive: the soil has had decades to develop without synthetic inputs, and the results show in the flavour.
What makes genuine matcha different
The word matcha is used loosely in some commercial contexts, but true matcha has specific requirements. To qualify, the tea must be grown and processed in Japan, must use tencha leaves only, and must be shade-grown for the final weeks before harvest. That shading period — typically three to four weeks — causes the plant to produce more chlorophyll and theanine as it works harder to photosynthesise in reduced light. The result is the deep green colour, the characteristic umami note and the rounded, slightly sweet finish that define genuine ceremonial-grade matcha.
After harvest, the tencha leaves are de-stemmed and de-veined before being slowly stone-ground into a fine powder. Stone-grinding is a slow process — a single stone mill produces only around thirty to forty grams per hour — but it preserves the integrity of the leaf in a way that faster mechanical processing cannot. The heat generated by stone-grinding is minimal, which protects the delicate aromatic compounds in the leaf.
Ceremonial grade versus culinary grade
Matcha is generally divided into ceremonial and culinary grades, and the distinction matters if you are buying it for drinking rather than baking.
Ceremonial grade uses the finest, youngest leaves from the first spring harvest. The colour is a vivid, saturated green and the flavour is smooth, rounded and complex — suitable for drinking straight, whisked with water, in the traditional manner. Culinary grade uses later-harvest leaves and may include more of the stem, resulting in a more astringent, bitter profile that works well in cooking and baking but is less pleasant to drink plain.
Our matcha from Shimizu Tani is ceremonial grade — intended for drinking, with the flavour complexity to stand on its own without milk, sweeteners or additions.
How to get the most from it
Matcha is prepared differently from steeped tea. A small amount of powder — around half a teaspoon — is sifted into a bowl to remove any clumps, then whisked with hot water (at around 75 to 80 degrees Celsius, not boiling) using a bamboo whisk, or chasen. The whisking motion should be brisk and consistent — a W or M pattern works well — until a light froth forms on the surface.
The result is a rich, smooth cup with a clean, lingering finish. For a fuller guide to the preparation process, the ceremony behind it and how to adapt it for everyday home use, our post on the magic of matcha covers everything you need to know.
Sourcing and certification
Our matcha is Soil Association certified organic — verified to the same standards as the rest of our range. Single-origin sourcing means we know exactly where the tea comes from, how it was grown and how it was processed. That traceability matters to us in the same way it matters to shoppers who want confidence in what they are buying.
If you are new to matcha and want to understand how it fits into the wider world of green tea, our post on green tea history and character is a useful starting point. For the ceremonial grade matcha itself, you can find it here: organic matcha green tea from Shimizu Tani garden.
