18+ Most Exciting Chinese Drinks To Enjoy In 2022
The country is teeming with signature drinks that can be found nowhere else. At the same time, many of its beloved beverages are brought from the outside and modified to suit the local taste. This post will cover every type of Chinese drink you need to know about.
8 Traditional Chinese Drinks With Tea To Enjoy
After enjoying the delicious dishes that Chinese cuisine offers, it is customary to round off your meal with tea. But what to choose from numerous types of Chinese tea available? You will find the answer in this section.
1. White Tea
The mountainous Fujian province in southeastern China is well-known for this low-caffeine tea. Local people harvest the young tea buds and leaves in the early season when they are still cloaked in snowy hair, hence the name.
Those tender, delicate shoots are sun-dried or heated until they are fuzzy but still retain a light green color. To get the best out of its flavor and health benefits, you should brew it with water below 85°C, where the water is hot but not very foamy.
White tea has a very mildly sweet taste accompanied by a floral fragrance. It is very subtle, so adding sugar or milk to the tea isn’t recommended. Looking at its beautiful pale yellow color and taking its herbal smell, you can imagine an emerald sea of tea hills thriving in the springtime.
There are many varieties of white tea: monkey-picked one (not really harvested by monkeys, though), silver needle, or white peony. They are all expensive but worth every cent you pay for.
2. Black Tea
The tea derives its name from the dark color of its withered, brittle leaves. But the strong substance it produces can have any color from pale amber to dark orange. The higher its oxidation level is, the darker and more powerful it will become.
While people create black tea from the same tea plant, Camellia sinensis, as other varieties, the rigorous fermentation and drying process causes it to stand out from the crowd. In fact, the Chinese people usually call it fermented tea or dark tea to mark the difference.
Black tea has been a cornerstone of Chinese tea culture for centuries. Countless generations have delighted themselves with the tea’s intense and diverse flavor, whether fruity, earthly, or malty. Another plus point is that this variety is versatile, meaning it can mix with other drinks like milk.
There are three main types of black tea, divided into further sub-categories with disparate tastes and prices. Whether you like Xiao Zhong, Gongfu, or broken black tea, you can have it all.
3. Green Tea
Many traditional Asian recipes go nicely with this easy-to-make drink. And a Chinese meal is no exception. In fact, green tea has been the most preferred form of tea in this country for millennia, from the time of the mythological Emperor Shennong.
Unlike other varieties of tea which undergo a lengthy process of oxidation, green tea is only pan-fried lightly before being steeped in hot water. The resulting drink possesses a verdant green color and a herbaceous taste evocative of fresh-cut grasses.
While brewing green tea sounds simple, different varieties require their own methods. By the rule of thumb, high-quality tea calls for cooler water and shorter steeping time than the substandard one. Otherwise, the grassy sweetness of the tea will turn bitter.
You’re probably familiar with Matcha from Japan. It is a kind of green tea that is steamed and ground into powder. Meanwhile, Chinese people only pan-fry their leaves before brewing them for a lighter and fresher taste.
4. Oolong Tea
A semi-oxidized drink, oolong tea stands between green tea and black tea. It comes in many forms and colors, depending on how people dry and roast the tea. Products with low oxidation levels produce tea with bright colors and a sweet scent, much like green tea.
On the other extreme, more oxidized oolong tea (higher than 50%) bears a stronger resemblance to black tea. After brewing it, you will enjoy a nutty-tasting tea with deep shades of brown or orange.
Adjusting the oxidation is laborious work that drives up the production cost of oolong tea. The good news is that oolong is one of the most health-beneficial tea types. For example, it can help you lose weight due to being full of antioxidants that melt fat and reduce your cravings for food.
5. Tie Guan Yin
Usually translated as the “Iron Goddess of Mercy”, Tie Guan Yin is a wonderful drink for people with a deep pocket. It falls under the category of oolong tea. This premium product first appeared in Anxi, Fujian, around the 19th century.
Legend has it that a local peasant, though poor, dutifully venerated an iron statue of Guan Yin (Chinese Goddess of Mercy). The Goddess gave him a treasure location that contained a tea shoot as a reward. The peasant grew it, sold the delicious tea, and finally led an easy life.
One sip of Tie Guan Yin will reveal why “treasure” is an apt term for it. The floral fragrance and sweet, berry-like smell is pure pleasure in a liquid form. Even though the tea may leave behind streaks of bitterness, they will quickly turn into a lingering honey aftertaste. Read More…
