The History of Tea in Japan

At this in japan's history, a lot of the modern methods we used to prepare tea at this point had yet to be invented. Tea was produced in a dried, circular brick that then had to be ground on what is called a druggist mortar,. This is a device that looks like a wheel on an axle over a metal trough. The result is something much grainier and much more bitter that generally had to be sweetened or had ginger added to it to make it more palatable.