I usually buy matcha to use for cooking at near-by grocery store.
This kind of matcha is called Usucha. (thin tea) and widely used for cooking and beverages.
As you may know, there are two types of matcha, one is Usu-cha, the another is Koi-cha.
Usui means thin and Koi means thick in Japanese.
When I took Matcha lessons at school, I was lucky enough to taste Koi-cha many times.
But it took for a while until my teacher finally allowed me to do practice for Koicha.
Yes, you are expected to know about Chado (Sado) to some certain extent before learning Koicha.
I can say Koi-cha is totally different from Usu-cha.
It's a bit difficult to explain....
It's bitter but sweet (no sugar though) and very creamy. I think if you try Koicha, it probably changes the concept of what matcha is all about!
I think the number of people knowing what Koicha tastes like is quite small even here in Japan.
Too shame....
This is one of the famous Matcha stores in Kyoto:
Tsujiri- very famous for Matcha Parfait and handling many types Usu-cha and Koicha
How to identify "Koicha" and "Usucha" - For Koicha, the name of product always ends with ”～の昔( ---no mukashi)” whereas Usucha with "の白(---no shiro)”.
If you find the names of Great Master of Tea Ceremon
Every time when you are invited to Tea ceremony, you are expected to ask questions about tea, utensils and tea cup used for the ceremony.
During the "question-answering " time, if you are asked about Matcha and you use those kind of "good" matcha, you always answer the name of matcha with information of the Great Master.
