Bente from Tanzanian Kilimanjaro Specialty Tea shares is extremely proud of her new products: three different matcha made from coffee leaves. “It was quite an expensive and intense process, but the first shops in Germany are selling it!”
You have been working on the matcha of coffee leaf. How is the reaction of the market?
It is doing really well! So far, the three coffeeshops from Rösterei in Düsseldorf in Germany are selling it. Initially they sold it only in the coffee shop or out of the window. But the first reactions of people who have bought it are good, so a new order has been made.
How do you look back on the development of the matcha of coffee leaf?
It was quite an expensive and intense process. First we had to make tea just like normal tea, in our case it is black tea. After this we had to roast the leaves and remove the veins, the hard bits. Once this has been done the leaves are ready to be grounded in a matcha stone. A very slow process, with 200 rounds per cup of matcha.
What does your matcha of coffee leaf taste like?
At the moment we offer three different matcha. Our Black Coffeeleaf Matcha has a rich taste with a smooth mouthfeel and a hint of chocolate and nuts. The Green Coffee Leaf Matcha tastes sweet with a lot of honey and sweetness of the coffee flowers once they have dried up after fruit setting. The last one we offer is the Coffee Flower Matcha: This matcha tastes much more like the real matchas from Green Tea. It does have a certain bitterness, but this is countered by a rich grassy taste which some herbal influences.
What do you expect of the product?
It is definitely only a product for serious tea or coffee lovers, so not a really big market. As it is expensive to make, it will never be mainstream.
