The hojicha trend: what the evidence shows and new ways to serve it

Since 2025, hojicha has appeared on café menus more often, but there are hardly any solid market figures. At home you can also cold-brew it, shake it or pour it over ice.Trend figures with sources, hojicha on menus since 2017, cold brew, shakerato and affogato.

Hojicha is roasted Japanese green tea, nutty and hardly bitter. Its origin, caffeine and brewing in a teapot are explained in hojicha, the roasted green tea. Recipes with powder and leaf for hot and cold milk drinks are in how to make a hojicha latte.

Most trend reports rely on a handful of figures. After those come serving ideas beyond the teapot and the latte.

The trend figures: often quoted, rarely backed up

The best-known figures come from announcements by the tea and flavour industry, not from market studies. In January 2026 a German supplier of tea and botanical raw materials reported an increase of 54.6 per cent. That was how much monthly searches for hojicha had risen since the start of 2025. It named TikTok and a US flavour manufacturer as the source.

In August 2026 a British tea retailer gave almost the same figures, without a source. Both probably go back to the same measurement, but that is our assessment.

The market figure is roughly €1.9 billion, and around €3.5 billion for 2034 (our conversion). The source does not say exactly what counts as the hojicha market. We therefore read it as a sign of growing interest, not as a measure of size.

On the menus: hojicha in Japan, Asia, the USA and Europe

Menus and dated product launches are more reliable than search curves.

Today the 540 yen equal roughly €3.20, and the 230 yen roughly €1.40 (our conversion).

For Europe, most figures relate to the UK. In Germany, a food trend list in August 2026 called hojicha more or less the successor to the matcha trend. We found no sales figures or café surveys for Germany.

The pattern is striking. Hojicha usually appears on menus sweet and with milk, often alongside matcha. In 2026 a British flavour supplier named sea salt with maple, peach with spices and brown sugar, and biscuit butter with banana as popular combinations.

Trend claims fact-checked

The most common claims from trend articles, held up against data from Japan.

More on the situation with matcha itself is in matcha shortage and prices. In February 2026 a tea exporter from Kyoto told a trade magazine that hojicha would not become what matcha is. Hojicha deserved to be known as a tea in its own right, not as the next matcha.

Cold-brewed: hojicha cold brew and an iced infusion with food

For a litre of cold brew, a US recipe blog steeps 10 g of hojicha in 1 litre of filtered water. The tea steeps in the fridge for 6 to 8 hours, then the leaves come out. It keeps in the fridge for 2 to 3 days. You may know the principle from cold brew coffee.

How many spoonfuls make 10 g depends heavily on the tea. Depending on the variety, the blog gives 3 to 5.5 tablespoons.

A Kyoto tea retailer’s iced infusion for stem hojicha is quicker. It brews 10 g with 300 ml of boiling water for 30 seconds. Then it pours everything at once into a bowl full of ice. It serves it with cold noodles.

Shakerato, old fashioned and affogato: serving hojicha like coffee

In December 2025 a Kyoto tea retailer published alcohol-free drinks modelled on coffee. For the shakerato, brew 4 tablespoons of leaf, which according to the retailer is around 10 g. Add around 75 ml of boiling water and let the tea steep for 2 minutes. Shake it for 10 seconds with 1 teaspoon of cane sugar syrup and ice, then strain it into a chilled glass.

For the old fashioned, brew the same amount of leaf with around 150 ml of boiling water for 1 minute. Let the infusion cool. Stir around 60 ml of it with 1 teaspoon of brown sugar syrup over ice. Finally, twist an orange peel over the glass and drop it in. We converted the millilitres from ounces.

The affogato uses powder. A tea house in Montreal heats 100 ml of milk without letting it boil. Then it whisks 1 heaped tablespoon of hojicha powder into it and pours everything over a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Hojicha with food: cake, chocolate and baking

The Kyoto retailer recommends chocolate cake with stem hojicha, cold or hot after dinner. The roasted aroma suits the cake’s syrupy sweetness, it says.

Baked goods usually contain the powder, because it can be stirred straight into dough and cream. The German raw material supplier names banana bread, cheesecake, ice cream and cocoa as uses.

You don’t need a shaker to get started. In the evening, steep 10 g of leaf in 1 litre of cold water and try it the next day with cake or chocolate.

Last updated: 24 October 2026.