Chawan
A tea bowl, and the oldest vessel on this list. Before there were gaiwan or kyusu or teapots, tea was made and drunk in a bowl. Today the chawan survives mainly in Japan for matcha, where it is the only vessel that both prepares the tea and serves it, because whisked matcha is never decanted.
- Capacity
- 350 to 500 ml, filled to well under a fifth
- Material
- glazed stoneware or porcelain, often raku
- Origin
- China, then Japan; the oldest tea vessel form
- Best for
- matcha, thin and thick
What it is
A wide clay bowl, usually glazed, holding perhaps 350 to 500 ml but never filled anywhere near that. The width is functional: a chasen needs room to move in a rapid forward-and-back motion, and a narrow bowl cramps it. Shapes vary by season, with wider, shallower bowls used in summer to help the tea cool and taller, narrower ones in winter to keep it warm. In the Japanese tea ceremony the host turns the bowl so its most pleasing face is toward the guest.
What it does to your tea
It sets whether the matcha can be whisked at all. Matcha is a suspension rather than an infusion, and the froth depends on the whisk being able to travel; a bowl with a rounded interior base and no sharp corner lets the chasen sweep without catching. A bowl that is too narrow or too straight-sided gives a thin, lumpy result no amount of technique will fix. Wall thickness matters too: too thin and it is too hot to hold and cools the tea fast, too thick and it never warms through. That is why a chawan outweighs an ordinary cup its size.
What it suits
Matcha, thin or thick. Also, quietly, any tea you want to drink slowly from a wide vessel, which is how tea was drunk for centuries before pots existed.
How to use one
Warm the bowl with hot water and warm the chasen in it at the same time, then dry the bowl before adding matcha, because water left in the bowl makes the powder clump. Sift the matcha in, add a little water at about 80 degrees, whisk briskly in a W or M motion from the wrist rather than stirring in circles, then finish by lifting the whisk through the centre to break the largest bubbles.
How to choose one
Look at the inside base. It should curve rather than meet the wall at an angle. Width matters more than volume: your hand and the whisk both need room. Beyond that a chawan is the one piece here bought largely on how it looks and feels, which is a legitimate reason and always has been.
Care and cleaning
Rinse with hot water and dry thoroughly before storing, and store it dry rather than covered, because a damp bowl in a closed box grows mould in the glaze crazing. Never use detergent on an unglazed or raku-fired bowl.
What people get wrong
Buying a bowl that looks the part and cannot be whisked in. Straight-sided modern bowls and anything narrow enough to be called a large cup will fight the whisk. The other mistake is filling it: a chawan holds far more than the 60 to 80 ml of usucha it is meant to serve, and the extra volume is there for the whisking, not for the tea.
What it is made of
Sources
- A chawan needs a certain wall thickness: too thin and it gets too hot to hold and lets the tea cool too fast, too thick and it never becomes warm enough. Pettigrew, J. & Richardson, B. (2008). Tea Classified: A Tealover's Companion
- A chawan needs a certain wall thickness: too thin and it gets too hot to hold and lets the tea cool too fast, too thick and it never becomes warm enough. Pettigrew, J. (2004). The Tea Companion: A Connoisseur's Guide, p.47-48