茶摘みで摘んだ葉はすぐに発酵が始まります。碾茶に仕立てるのはスピード勝負です。
まず新芽をふるいにかけ蒸し器に入れます。蒸すのはわずか1分足らず。長いと水分を含み過ぎてしまうのだそう。蒸し加減は熟練の作業です。品種やその年の出来によって蒸し器の角度や時間を調節します。
蒸した後は散茶機で下から風を送り、葉が重ならないよう高さ8mほど舞い上げ、冷やしながら水分を飛ばしベルトコンベアで乾燥炉に送ります。
送られた新芽は90〜180℃の乾燥炉の中で往復しながら20分ほどかけてじっくり乾燥させ、その後選別機で茎を取り除かれます。
こうしてできたお茶を碾茶（荒茶）といいます。この状態で食べてみるとお出汁の効いた焼きのりのような味がしました。
ここまでの工程が碾茶工場の作業です。茶問屋さんは荒茶を引き取り抹茶に仕立てていきます。それはまた次のブログでご紹介しますね。
The leaves picked during the tea harvest immediately begin to ferment. Turning them into tencha is a race against time.
First, the new buds are sifted and placed in a steamer. They are steamed for just under a minute. If it's too long, they end up absorbing too much moisture. Adjusting the steaming process requires skill and depends on the variety and quality of the year's harvest.
After steaming, the leaves are sent through a tea-spreading machine, which blows air from below, lifting them up to a height of about 8 meters, allowing them to cool while eliminating moisture. They are then sent to a drying furnace on a conveyor belt.
The fresh leaves sent to the drying furnace undergo a thorough drying process for about 20 minutes, moving back and forth in temperatures ranging from 90 to 180°C. Afterward, a sorting machine removes the stems.
The tea produced through this process is called tencha (coarse tea). When tasted in this state, it has a flavor reminiscent of savory roasted seaweed.
These are the steps involved in the operations of a tencha factory. Tea merchants take the tencha and refine it into matcha. We will introduce that in the next blog post.