Matcha Beer Is Apparently A Thing You Can Get For St. Patrick's Day & Someone Pinch Me

When it comes to St. Patrick's Day, there's virtually nothing more iconic than green beer. But the beer you're about to encounter isn't the love child of light beer and food coloring. Oh no. It's the love child of beer and matcha. Yup: Matcha beer is a thing, and it's a totally viable option if you're looking to celebrate Mar. 17 in a healthyish yet drunken manner.

American eatery Dig Inn, which has locations in New York and Boston, is serving up a "Matchabeer" special at its flagship SoHo location Dig House from Mar. 17-24 in celebration of St. Patrick's Day. A representative for Dig Inn tells Bustle that to make matchabeer, Dig Inn mixes a small amount of Peekskill Brewery's "Skills Pils," a locally brewed pilsner, with matcha powder to make a concentrate. The concentrate is then used to top off a full glass of straight beer, and the concentrate and beer slowly mix together to create a deep green truly worthy of St. Paddy's Day — no food coloring needed.

Bustle also learned that Dig Inn is pairing Skills Pils with New York City-based company MatchaBar's matcha. For folks not in the know, matcha is a stone-ground Japanese powdered green tea "historically used to enhance one's focus, energy, and alertness," according to MatchaBar. The brand's matcha is ceremonial grade, and it's sourced from an independent family farm in Japan. MatchaBar says on its website that its matcha has an "incredibly smooth, earthy flavor profile, with a creamy texture, natural sweetness, and a strong umami after-taste [sic]."

While matcha beer may be novel for the U.S., it's slightly more common in matcha's home country of Japan. SoraNews24 reported way back in 2013 that Kinshachi, a brewery based in Nagoya, Japan, had created a pre-bottled matcha beer, and according to the site, the matcha "fluffs up the beer foam for a beverage with a rich, velvety head that borders on physically impossible to stop drinking."

Mike also noted that the drink was becoming common "at bars and restaurants [...] especially in the Kyoto area, where it's proving popular with women for its lower alcohol content and less bitter taste compared to draft beer." Not to mention the Japanese social media users who were posting snaps of their own homemade matcha beer cocktails on Twitter, he added.

Another Japanese brewery, Yebisu, popped up with its own matcha beer in February 2017, called the Matsuri, SoraNews24 reported. The Matsuri, which at the time cost 750 yen (about $7 U.S. now), was made with fresh tea upon order, and was only served at two of Yebisu Bar's locations.

If you're not able to get out to Dig Inn, but you're keen to mix a little tea into your St. Patrick's Day celebration, you're in luck: Matcha beer is actually not that difficult to make at home. Tea specialist Stefan Ramirez, who recently started serving matcha beer at his New York City teahouse 29B, told Well + Good that it may be tough to find a beer that tastes good with matcha. But after experimenting, eventually Ramirez settled on Koshihikari Echigo Beer, a rice beer that's "naturally sweeter and doesn't have a strong finish." Once you find a beer you like, all you have to do is purchase some matcha powder and do what Ramirez and Dig Inn both do — mix the matcha with a small amount of beer, whisk them together, and pour it into a full glass of the same beer.

If you're looking for a semi-healthy spin on a St. Patrick's Day fave, matcha beer might be something you can try out on your own, or persuade your neighborhood watering hole to start serving. It's easy, it's tasty, and it's very, very green.