TEA's BIBLE

Grades and cuts

Aracha (crude tea)

Tea as the farm finishes it — leaf, stem and dust still mixed together, and still fairly moist. Merchants then sort it and fire it to make the finished tea you buy. When Japanese statistics quote production figures, they mean tea at this stage.

In more detail

At the aracha stage, large leaf, dust and stem are all mixed together. Sieving and air separation sort it by size, and the final firing turns it into finished tea. What gets separated out is demono. Note that production statistics quote aracha weight, before finishing, so they do not match what reaches a shop.

Related terms

Share this page