Sencha Tea Bar.

Sencha Tea Bar opened in Uptown in 2002 under a different name: it was Tea Garden then, and by the shop's own account one of the first places in the Twin Cities to pour bubble tea. The rename came in 2015, when loose leaf moved to the front of the business. The counter is at 2601 Hennepin Ave S, and it still works as a bar as much as a shop — bubble tea, tea lattes and freshly brewed leaf are made in front of you.

The online list runs past eighty teas sold as a one-ounce sample, which is the whole idea: a tea costs about what a sandwich costs. Only four of them pass seven dollars — Silver Needles, Jasmine Dragon Pearls, Gyokuro and Black Dragon Pearls. The single-origin blacks — Assam, Keemun, Kenya Black, Yunan Oro, Lapsang, Darjeeling — sit between $3.99 and $5.99, next to a long row of black and green blends. There are whites and oolongs by the handful, two pu-erhs, half a dozen chais, a yerba mate, and a wall of botanicals sold by the two ounces: hibiscus, lemongrass, rose petals, licorice root, elderberries.

Five items break the one-ounce rule and start at two: the ceremonial matcha, three premium greens — Spring Song, Sencha Superior and the first-flush Sencha Premier — and the Ali Shan oolong, which is the most expensive tea on the list. Beyond Uptown the company's own story page lists tea bars in Saint Paul, Woodbury and Madison, Wisconsin, and the same loose leaf ships nationwide, free over $49. Since 2024 the company has been part of Amplified Experiences, a Twin Cities beverage group formed when Sencha merged with Five Watt Coffee.