A bag of Sayama tea carries the printed words “Sayama hiire,” or Sayama firing. The hint of heat in the term can bring roasted, toasty tea to mind. But hiire is the name of a finishing process, while hojicha is the name of a tea.

This piece reads the city of Sayama’s description of the process alongside Honoka, a stem hojicha from the Sayama tea farm Sasaraya. It keeps the work of heating apart from the work of choosing materials.

Heat at the finishing stage

Lift the lid of the teapot, and a soft scent of dry leaves rises. Sayama hiire is the step of applying heat as tea is being finished.

Much as autumn sun dries persimmons and sweetens them, one round of heating serves several purposes. The city’s description names drying the tea well so it keeps longer. The other is drawing out aromas through heat, lifting both flavour and scent.

Think of applying heat only as darkening the tea, and part of the finishing work slips out of view. The sources say this much: it is a step that dries, preserves and brings out aroma. Next is the difference between a process name and a tea name.

A process name, a tea name

The colour in the cup alone says nothing about which steps the tea went through. Whether a tea has had hiire and whether it is hojicha are two different questions.

The city’s account places hiire as one stage within finishing. Tea that goes through Sayama hiire does not thereby become hojicha. Sharing the use of heat does not make two steps the same.

When “hiire” turns up in a product description, the thing to read for is which tea is being finished, and at what stage. The sources go as far as this: looking at the work before and after shows where a step belongs. Next is a bag that carries the word stem in its name.

A stem tea with leaves in it

Open a bag of stem tea, and pieces of leaf sometimes show between the thin stems. Kuki Hojicha Honoka, a stem hojicha, contains leaves as well as stems.

Sasaraya says it selects stems and large leaves from the first harvest of the Yabukita and Sayamakaori cultivars, then roasts them. That one sentence holds three things: cultivar, harvest timing and the parts used. The name says stem, but the material is not stems alone.

The sources ask only that a reader not stop at the words “stem hojicha,” and look at what the maker chose to bring together. Where the process and the product come from is gathered below.

The numbers in detail

Process source
The description comes from the Sayama tea guide of Sayama City, Saitama Prefecture.
Definition of hiire
Sayama hiire is defined as applying heat at the finishing stage of tea.
First aim
To dry the tea thoroughly for better storage.
Second aim
To develop aromas through heating, improving flavour and scent.
Honoka’s cultivars
Kuki Hojicha Honoka is a product of Sasaraya, a Sayama tea farm, made from the Yabukita and Sayamakaori cultivars.
Honoka’s materials
Stems and large leaves are selected from the first harvest and roasted. The name mentions stems, but the material includes leaves too.