Matcha Sparkling Water

February 7th, 2008 Posted in Cooking Accessories

Even the most dedicated oenophiles can’t serve wine EVERY night, but the problem is always the same: what the hell else do you serve with good food? Soft drinks? Juice? Uh, no. Water? Well, yes. . . . Sparkling water? Sure, there’s nothing like a little sparkling at the table. But its solo presence in some ways highlights the ABSENCE of wine, at least to this dedicated wino.

So the task I set out for myself was: come up with a nonalcoholic beverage that actually pairs well with food. My first thoughts centered around tea. But hot tea doesn’t really work with food, and iced tea is great when it’s hot, especially for lunch, but a pitcher of iced tea at the table just doesn’t, I dunno, set the right mood somehow.

And then I serendipitously tasted something that changed the whole game. My friend Eddie had brought over what I thought was chilled champagne. It was champagne colored, and in a champagne bottle. But it was … tea! Jasmine tea, fermented as konbucha, and blasted with C02 to produce one of the cleanest, creamiest, perfect-with-food beverages I have ever tasted.

I bugged Eddie to set me up with a tank of my own, so that I could explore this pretty brave new world of carbonated waters and teas. We started off by making pomegranate-meyer lemon water, which was so good I could barely control myself! The possibilities seemed endless — I could do savory herb infusions, every tea known to mankind, tisane blends, citrus waters of all stripes . . . .

And then, just for fun, I made my usual afternoon cup of matcha and instead of drinking it let it cool, and poured it into a glass bottle. I filled it with icy filtered water, blasted it with CO2, and voila! It has no sugar, and all the sophistication of matcha. Refreshing as hell, and yet pairs well with food, especially Japanese-inspired food. I imagine it would look incredible with a fancy label in a real champagne bottle. Quite the unusual gift to bring to a dinner party!

matchasparklingwaterbottle.JPGEddie has since started his own sparkling tea line, and it’s remarkable.

My other sparkling favorites so far have been Marriage Frere Marco Polo, hojicha, rooibos paradiso, and the pom-meyer. Let me know if you have ideas for more, and I’ll try them and report back!

  1. 18 Responses to “Matcha Sparkling Water”

  2. By Honeycrisp on Feb 7, 2008

    Eric, I love this idea. My fiance’s family is Muslim and therefore doesn’t appreciate wine like we do. But there really is something quite boring about plain water or tea served with fantastic meals. Any suggestions of what might pair well with Pakistani curries?

  3. By Eric on Feb 7, 2008

    Thanks honey, I love it too. What do they drink normally in Pakistan, say during the day? Some kind of fresh citrus ade? I didn’t put it into the entry but I made a very nice sparkling the other day by simmering some star anise, and just a touch of honey, and adding that mixture to cold filtered water and gassing it. It was great! Something tells me that would go well with fiery curry.

  4. By Karena on Feb 7, 2008

    This is why you write cookbooks, Eric, and I work in a cubicle. :)

    In the summer, we always seem to have half-full bottles of Pellegrino in the fridge. I hate letting them go flat, so I drop fruit and produce directly into them to infuse.

    One of my favorites is inspired by what I call “spa water.” I dice cucumber, lemon, and mint and drop it directly into the bottle. It sits overnight, then I take it to work with me.

    Another favorite is lemon verbena. It’s usually just $1/bunch (or free from my mother in law’s garden) and looks so pretty in a pitcher of sparkling water.

    And this one I thought was just a way to use up iced tea left over from a barbeque. Mango iced tea and lychee iced tea are great cut with a little sparkling water.

  5. By Eric on Feb 7, 2008

    I used to do that too, and it’s great! What really got me started in making my own sparkling, though, was the schlep, and sheer waste, of all those Pellegrino bottles, not to mention the carbon footprint of getting water — WATER! — shipped here all the way from Italy.

    The set up costs about $150 for new, full tank, regulator, hoses, clamps, etc., but it paid for itself in no time flat.

  6. By ernie on Feb 8, 2008

    You could get started for a lot less money with a standard seltzer dispenser. Target sells several models for 40-60 dollars. I don’t think they work on thick liquids, though, so no mango lassi fizz…

  7. By Karena on Feb 11, 2008

    Can you post on how to set up a filtration/carbonation system at home? We have a Brita at home and don’t purchase sparkling water unless we’re having a party, but I’d like to eliminate even that purchase. I’ve looked into Seltzer Sisters, but I want to stay away from a subscription. Thanks!

  8. By Eric on Feb 12, 2008

    Karena, you’ll need:

    * a CO2 tank, available at Airgas in SF.
    * a pressure regulator for the CO2 tank. Here’s the one I use:
    http://www.beveragefactory.com/draftbeer/regulator/double/742BF.shtml

    * Plastic caps that allow you to carbonate in commercial
    PET bottles like 2 liter Coke plastic bottle.
    http://morebeer.com/view_product/18250/

    A few hardware items like a ball-lock connector, beverage tubing, barbed swivel nuts, hose clamps, and one or two other small piece of hardware.
    Email me if you want a complete list. I’m making it look daunting, but it’s really not, Eddie set mine up in about 10 minutes.

  9. By ellen on Feb 15, 2008

    it still sounds daunting to me. could you explain the difference between this set up and the seltzer thing ernie described? thanks.

  10. By Reader on Feb 16, 2008

    May I please piggyback on Karena’s post and ask you to e-mail me the complete list of supplies needed to make carbonated waters and teas?

    Do any of the supplies include directions on HOW to bring all these parts together to produce a working filtration/carbonation system? If not, can you tell me the book or website Eddie consulted?

    Thank you, Eric–and Eddie!

  11. By Anonymous on Feb 16, 2008

    I was trying to make Green Tea ice cream and is wondering what is the best way to dissolve matcha?Everytime I try to dissolve matcha, the matcha becomes lumpy and cannot be smooth out.

  12. By Anonymous on Feb 17, 2008

    What is the best way to dissolve matcha in cold liquid. I was following a recipe for Green Tea ice cream and I had difficulty dissolving matcha in cold liquid because it the matcha did not dissolve completely and became lumpy. I had to strain out the lumps. I tried it twice and was not successful.

    Thanks for your help.

  13. By Eric on Feb 20, 2008

    OK, I’ll ask Eddie to compile a brief list in some easily digestible format, and will post it here when I hear back from him.

    Anonymous: it’s hard to dissolve matcha completely in cold liquid. Try it with hot, and cool it. You can also use a fine sieve when you scoop the tea into a bowl or cup, and “tap” it into the bowl, like you would powdered sugar over a cake.

    Most Japanese tea aficionados whisk hot water and matcha in a bowl with a small bamboo whisk, but I prefer the small, hand-held electric whisk used mainly for foaming milk for coffee drinks.

  14. By Eric on Feb 21, 2008

    Until Eddie shows up, I found a system that looks an awful lot like mine:

    http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/001818.php

    This is from the blog of Kevin Kelley, of all people!

  15. By Eric on Feb 21, 2008

    This, by the way, is the ultimate geek site for aspiring CO2 maestras:

    http://www.truetex.com/carbonation.htm

    But I think he makes it look way too hard.

  16. By Eddie on Feb 21, 2008

    Howdy! The CoolTools version is actually pretty close to the kind of configuration I use. The one I put together for Eric has some features I didn’t see in that description….mostly modifications I made over the years based on frustrations using my own system. I learned how to make my first carbonator years ago from the ‘Truetex’ site linked in the previous post, but knowing what I know now there’s no reason to get quite that MacGyver about it. I never bench-tested any of the smaller systems like the one Ernie mentioned, but one drawback I can point out is that most of them run on small CO2 cartridges the size of shotgun shells, so for every bottle or so of seltzer produced you’re generating a small piece of unrecyclable metal waste. Certainly better than the 300 grams of glass and liter of H2O you would be bringing over from Italy or Germany if you went with the fancy shelf stuff, but still. The kind of system Eric has is 100% reusable hardware. Even the regular old 2 liter PET bottles we use, which are generally recycled after a single use in most households, will endure 50-100 or more batches on the carbonator.

    To a small extent I am going to refute Eric’s assertion that assembling one of these is an entirely trivial matter. Yes, when assembled correctly it is a pretty tame piece of kitchen technology. But it does involve high pressure gas valves, a bunch of small parts, and a visit to at least one store that has more loading docks than parking spaces. While you don’t have to be a union pipefitter, you should at least own a toolbox and be able to identify the names and uses of a majority of its contents.

    Also, beyond listing the individual parts I do not think that I could provide an effective set of assembly instructions without the use of some kind of diagram. I will put one of those together in PDF form and post a link here. Give me a couple of days. ;)

  17. By Eric on Feb 23, 2008

    Thanks Eddie! I didn’t mean to make it sound trivial, which I did. Easy for me to say, since you did the work!! Can’t wait to see the PDF doc — thanks on behalf of everyone here.

  18. By Michael on Feb 25, 2008

    Eric, Maybe this is for another blog post: Will you please recommend some particular matchas that you enjoy? I’ve seen regular and “big leaf” varieties.

  19. By Eric on Feb 25, 2008

    Michael, I will indeed devote a post to matcha soon, thanks for the suggestion.

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