Fukamushi Sencha (Deep-steamed)
Fukamushi sencha is regular sencha steamed two to three times longer than usual, and that single change rewrites the cup. The extended steaming breaks down the leaf and fragments it, producing a cloudy, deep-green, thick liquor that is mellow and full-bodied with very little astringency. The variable that matters most is the steam time itself: everything that makes fukamushi distinctive flows from it.
The dry leaf looks broken, small and almost powdery compared to standard (asamushi) sencha, and that is correct, not a sign of low quality. The brewed cup should be noticeably cloudy and a saturated deep green, with a thick, mouth-filling body and a sweet, mellow flavor that trades sencha's crisp clarity for richness. Good fukamushi smells fresh and green; stale or yellowed leaf and a flat, dull liquor mean old stock. Because the fine particles brew so fast and so fully, a fine-mesh kyusu is close to mandatory. The cloudiness is the style's signature, so do not read it as a defect.
Deep-steaming is strongly associated with Shizuoka's lowland and plateau regions such as Makinohara and Kakegawa, where the leaf tends to be thicker and more robust; longer steaming softens that body and tames astringency. Kagoshima also produces a great deal of fukamushi. It is a processing decision rather than a separate plant or region: the same Yabukita-dominated gardens that make ordinary sencha can steam deeper to make fukamushi.
Western: 70-80°C, 4 g per 200 ml, but only 30-45 seconds for the first steep because the broken leaf releases extremely fast, 2-3 infusions. In a kyusu: 70°C, 4-5 g per 150 ml, 10-20 seconds, with very small increases each steep. Use a fine-mesh pot; a coarse strainer lets the particles through and muddies the cup.
€15-35 (about $16-38) per 100 g for everyday fukamushi from Shizuoka or Kagoshima, with single-cultivar or first-flush lots reaching €40-70 (about $43-76). It sits at roughly the same price band as comparable standard sencha.
Prices reviewed June 2026
Sencha
Standard, lighter-steamed (asamushi) sencha, the clear, bright-cup baseline this deep-steamed style departs from.
Gyokuro
Reaches low astringency and rich umami through shading rather than long steaming, a different route to a mellow cup.
Konacha
Also yields a thick, cloudy green cup, but from sifted dust rather than deliberately deep-steamed whole leaf.
Deep-steaming was developed in part to make robust lowland leaf more drinkable; the cloudy soup that puts off newcomers is actually fine leaf particles in suspension, which is also why fukamushi tends to deliver more of the leaf solids into the cup than clear-brewing sencha.