[Industry Interview] June 2003 18
Matcha is a kind of tea powder, but it is different from ordinary tea powder. This kind of tea powder has unique flavor and health care function, and can be used as an additive in food.
So, what is matcha? What are the characteristics of matcha? What are the uses of matcha in food? What is the market prospect of matcha? With these questions, the reporter recently interviewed Mr. Wang Yu, an expert on matcha research in China and the chairman of Nanjing Weierkang Bioengineering Co., Ltd. Mr. Wang Yu believes that matcha, as a natural and healthy new food additive, has a very bright application prospect in the food industry.
The history and concept of matcha
Reporter: For most people in China, matcha is a relatively unfamiliar concept. Chairman Wang, you are a matcha expert in China. Please briefly introduce the definition of matcha to readers all over the country.
Wang Yu (Wang for short): As you said, few people in China know the meaning of matcha. Even if someone has heard of matcha, they will first think of matcha and tea ceremony in Japan. In fact, Japanese matcha and tea ceremony were introduced from ancient China, and they are descendants of China matcha.
Historically, matcha can be divided into ancient matcha and modern matcha.
Reporter: Please talk about the definition of ancient matcha.
Wang: Ancient matcha, also called end tea, is a kind of tea powder with small particles, which is made of high-quality new tea and processed by steaming, kneading and baking. Its appearance is natural green.
According to textual research, there are records about late tea in the ancient books of Wei and Jin Dynasties. The ancient book describes the scene after the end tea is brewed as: "The foam sinks and the flowers float, and the leaves come in spring." In the Tang and Song Dynasties, tea has become an indispensable mainstream drink in people's daily life. As the saying goes, "Fu tea is for civilian use, which is equal to salt and rice. It can't be used for one day."
Unfortunately, late tea died out in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, about 400 years ago. Although there are more than 600 monographs on tea science in ancient and modern times, there are not many records about tea in the end. So it is not surprising that modern people know little about late tea.
Reporter: Please introduce the definition of modern matcha.
Wang: Modern matcha is a natural steamed green tea superfine powder processed by new technology and equipment on the basis of ancient tea powder. It is the crystallization of organic combination of modern high technology and traditional technology.
In terms of particle size, modern matcha is finer than ancient tea. The fineness of ancient tea powder can only reach 150 mesh, while the fineness of modern matcha can reach 3000 mesh. (Reporter's note: 2500 mesh is 5 microns, 425 mesh is 33 microns, and 200 mesh is 74 microns)
In processing technology, modern matcha is more complicated than ancient tea. Because it involves a lot of very professional knowledge, I won't introduce it in detail. However, there is a significant difference in technology: in the process of making modern matcha, modern superfine grinding technology is adopted, which makes the particle size of modern matcha smaller than that of ancient tea. However, in the production process of ancient tea powder, there was no modern equipment and no use of superfine grinding technology. In addition, modern matcha production also applies advanced biological breeding technology, advanced tea garden management technology, modern sterilization technology and preservation technology.
Reporter: Just now you said that modern matcha was developed on the basis of ancient tea, which can be said to be the continuation and improvement of tradition. Excuse me, how was ancient tea made?
Wang: Tea powder is the fine powder of steamed green tea. In the Yuan Dynasty, Wang Zhen recorded the production technology of ancient steamed green tea in the Agricultural Book: "Grain Rain is the best tea picker"; After picking, "retort is steamed, and cooked is good." Steamed, spread a thin layer with basket foil, knead it slightly when wet, bake it, spread the fire evenly to dry, and don't scorch it. Braid bamboo and bake it, wrap it with bamboo sticks and collect your anger. "Then," into the mill ". This is the earliest and most complete record of the production technology of steamed green tea in ancient China. Tea in the mid-Tang and Song Dynasties and even before the Ming Dynasty should have been made in this way.
Reporter: When was China Modern Matcha successfully developed?
Wang: China Modern Matcha was developed by our company after years of hard work, and it was first successfully developed in China at the end of the 20th century.
Reporter: What is the positive significance of processing green tea into ultra-fine powder, that is, matcha?
Wang: As we all know, tea is a good nutritious food. How to improve the utilization rate and absorption rate of tea in human body has always been a problem studied by scientists and enterprises all over the world. Scientific research shows that the smaller the particle size of tea powder, the easier it is for the nutrients to be dissolved and absorbed by the human body when drinking. In the production of Chinese herbal medicine and health care products, cell wall-breaking technology is usually used to improve the nutritional value and bioavailability of health care products, which is also the same reason.
Modern matcha has higher nutritional and health care value than ancient tea, because the former has better solubility and permeability.
Characteristics of matcha
Reporter: What are the characteristics of modern matcha?
Wang: In the process of developing matcha for many years, we have summarized six characteristics of matcha.
Reporter: Please introduce the six characteristics of matcha in detail.
Wang: 1. Super fine. The median particle size of matcha is 3 ~ 10 micron. 2. Three principles. Matcha has the characteristics of primary color, original flavor and original quality. 3. Sanqing. Fragrant, clear mouth, slightly green (grass) gas. 4. Three highs and two lows. Protein, amino acids and chlorophyll are very high; But the contents of tea polyphenols and caffeine are low. 5. Strong hygroscopicity. Because of its small particle size and large specific surface area. 6. Double green. First, it is green in the sense of environmental protection, which conforms to the trend of environmental protection; Secondly, matcha itself is a natural emerald green to dark green, giving people a visual aesthetic feeling.
Function and nutrition of matcha
Reporter: Please talk about the function of matcha.
Wang: The available scientific research data show that tea has 23 health-care functions. These functions include clearing away heat and toxic materials, promoting fluid production to quench thirst, resisting fatigue, promoting digestion and relieving boredom, sobering up, promoting diuresis and relaxing bowels, resisting tumor, lowering blood pressure, preventing radiation, improving eyesight and clearing liver. It is a natural healthy food.
Matcha is a kind of natural food with high nutritional value, which retains more than 500 kinds of ingredients in tea, including protein, fat, sugar, vitamins and minerals.
Matcha is an ultra-fine powder obtained after deep processing of tea, which takes into account the advantages of drinking tea and eating tea, and has higher nutritional value and health care value than tea.
Reporter: You just said that the nutritional value and health care value of matcha are higher than that of tea. Please use data to illustrate this problem.
Wang: From the perspective of effective utilization rate, there is obvious difference between the two. Tea is brewed with water, and water can only extract 30% nutrients. Matcha can bring almost 100% nutrients in tea to human body. The main reason for this remarkable difference is that the processing technology and technology adopted by them are different.
Taking chlorophyll content as an example, the chlorophyll content of matcha is 5-6 times higher than that of green tea. The average content of chlorophyll in finished dry green tea is generally 0.6%, while the content of chlorophyll in matcha can reach 3 ~ 5%.
The difference between matcha and ordinary green tea powder
Reporter: Green tea powder is also a fine powder of tea, which was born in China for a long time. What are the similarities and differences between ordinary green tea powder and matcha?
Wang: Let me talk about the similarities between these two kinds of tea powder first. Matcha and ordinary green tea powder are both fine tea powders processed from green tea, which have the characteristics of green tea, including color, fragrance, taste and nutritional value.
Reporter: What's the difference between the two?
Wang: Matcha is different from ordinary green tea powder, and it is not broken tea in the general sense. The difference between matcha and ordinary green tea powder mainly includes the following aspects:
1. Different production processes. The brief production process of matcha is: high-quality fresh green tea → steaming → grinding → ancient tea powder → ultrafine grinding → low-temperature drying → modern matcha. Matcha production adopts traditional grinding technology and modern superfine grinding technology, and the whole processing process is always carried out at low temperature, which can well retain the active components in tea.
Ordinary green tea powder is mostly made by directly pulverizing steamed and roasted green tea.
2. Different raw materials. Matcha requires high quality of raw materials, high content of amino acids, protein and chlorophyll, and low content of tea polyphenols and caffeine. Before picking, there are requirements for the picking time and leaf size of new tea. The production time of matcha is short, only about 50 days. Matcha made from high-quality new tea produced in April and May has the best quality. Tea varieties used for processing matcha are also very particular. This kind of tea tree is cultivated by asexual propagation technology, which ensures the purity of tea tree varieties. In addition, in order to ensure the quality of fresh leaves, in the process of planting, the staff also need to shade the tea trees for heatstroke prevention. Tea produced in this way is called covered tea. Matcha is made of covered tea.
Green tea powder is processed from ordinary tea leaves, with mixed quality, and most tea trees are hybrids.
3. Different tastes. Matcha is fragrant, clear-mouthed, slightly grassy and fresh and elegant in taste.
The aroma of green tea powder is mixed and impure, or the aroma is insufficient, or the aroma of chestnuts is more than enough. In taste, the bitterness of green tea powder is heavier, and there is no fresh alcohol and slight grass fragrance of matcha.
4. The price is different. Matcha belongs to the middle and high-grade deep processing products of tea, and its price is relatively high. The market price per ton is more than RMB100000, which is twice that of green tea powder.
5. The scope of application is different. Because the nutritional value and health care value of matcha are higher than that of green tea powder, its application range is also wider than that of green tea powder.
Application of matcha
Reporter: What are the uses of matcha in the food industry?
Wang: Matcha combines natural green, aroma, nutrition and health care functions. It is a green food raw material with unique taste. As a new food additive, matcha has a very bright application prospect in food industry, and its uses come from two aspects: 1. Improve the nutritional value and health care value of food; 2. Provide pure tea fragrance for food and provide material basis for developing new food.
Reporter: What food fields can matcha be used in?
Wang: Matcha can be used in high-grade foods such as ice cream, yogurt, milk, moon cakes, candy, jelly, drinks, health food and tea ceremony. In addition, matcha can also be used in the production of pharmaceutical intermediates, cosmetics and other products.
Green tea is mostly used in biscuits, feed, low-grade cold food and other low-grade foods.
Reporter: What is the application status of matcha in China?
Wang: At present, in the domestic market, 70% of matcha is used as food additive, 20% is used in beverage production and tea ceremony, and 65,438+00% is used in medicine and cosmetics industries.
Reporter: What are the industrialized matcha foods in China? Please give an example.
Wang: Matcha foods already on the market include Matcha ice cream from Yili Group, Matcha yogurt from Guangming Group, Matcha moon cakes from Dasanyuan Company and Matcha toffee from Loy Company.
In addition, matcha milk beverage, matcha soybean milk, matcha beverage, matcha capsule and other products are also under development and will be listed soon.
Market prospect of matcha
Reporter: What do you think of the market prospect of matcha?
Wang: Matcha is a promising food additive for several reasons. 1. Matcha is a natural, healthy, environmentally friendly and convenient food additive, and it is the development direction of food additives.
Secondly, China's matcha culture has a broad spirit and is rich in profound Wu-Yue culture. Food culture is an important part of national culture, and matcha culture is the essence of China food culture, which plays a very important role in people's daily diet, social communication and foreign exchange. Nowadays, the living standards of our people have improved significantly, and their spiritual life has become increasingly rich. There is a growing demand for matcha, the quintessence of China. Therefore, under the current situation, matcha has the practical significance of vigorously developing; With the rise of modern high technology, the possibility of matcha dating has become a reality.
Throughout the world food market, beverages are the most consumed food. Coca-Cola's "Red Sea" and Pepsi's "Blue Ocean" once surged around the world. Compared with the above two, the "green ocean" created by matcha with its true green, true fragrance and true taste can better show the charm of natural health.
In recent years, the rising consumption fever of matcha at home and abroad also fully shows that the market space of matcha is very broad.
Reporter: From a global perspective, where is matcha most popular?
Wang: Worldwide, the United States and Japan are the consumption hotspots of matcha for several reasons: 1. The United States and Japan are very developed in science and technology, and there are many studies on the function of tea. 2. Americans and Japanese nationals have higher cultural quality and a better understanding of the health care function of tea. The economic conditions of American and Japanese nationals are world-class, and they have the strength to enjoy matcha with high quality and high price.
People in many countries in Europe and Southeast Asia are more and more enthusiastic about the consumption of matcha.
At present, only Japan produces matcha abroad, with an annual output of about 1000 tons, which is mostly used in Japan and rarely exported.
Judging from these circumstances, China's matcha will have a good development prospect overseas.
From the domestic situation, with the improvement of living standards, the consumption enthusiasm of China consumers for matcha will also rise rapidly. According to the analysis, in the next 5 ~ 10 years, the market capacity of matcha and matcha food in China will reach more than10 billion yuan, and matcha will play an increasingly important role in China's food industry.
Reporter: As the vanguard of the domestic matcha industry, how will your company promote matcha?
Wang: In order to promote this excellent food raw material, we plan to take effective measures in the following aspects:
1. Intensify publicity and hold publicity classes all over the country. First, publicize the nutritional and health care functions of matcha; The second is to publicize the strong matcha culture and the real art of China tea ceremony.
2. Develop high-end customers. Simply put, the customers of matcha are divided into two parts: one is a food enterprise that uses matcha as a food additive; The second is to face consumers, develop matcha terminal products and provide them directly to consumers.
If matcha is promoted as a food additive, we will focus on developing some big customers and cooperating with large food enterprises.
At the same time, it cooperates with some large catering enterprises, large food distributors and high-end tea houses in China, and uses matcha as a terminal product and sells it directly to consumers with better economic conditions.
3. Strengthen technical services. Because modern matcha has not been listed in China for a long time, the development technology of matcha food is not mature, and there are fewer kinds of matcha food. This situation directly restricts the production and sales of matcha. To this end, our company cooperated with many universities in China to develop a variety of matcha foods, such as matcha ice cream, matcha yogurt, matcha moon cakes, matcha chocolate and so on. In the future promotion work, we will provide technical development services for our customers.