On our trip around Erhai Hu, we made another stop in the village of Xizhou to witness a performance of traditional Bai dancing. The Bai ethnic group is one of the many minority groups located in Yunnan, and is the primary group situated around Erhai Hu.
While witnessing the performance, we were served three courses of tea, which is a Bai tradition. The teas each had a different taste and were served in the following order (in photo, from left to right):
1) Bitter -- This tea had a charcoal-like taste. It reminded me of green tea, like a Longjing tea (one of China's most famous, from Hangzhou) that had steeped for too long.
2) Sweet -- The sweet tea featured tea water from which the tea had been removed. Floating in the sweet, mild liquid were slivers of walnut and a mild cheese, which imparted an oily flavor.
I was taken aback by this drink -- it almost didn't seem like tea to me. I did enjoy the nuts and cheese, but prefer to eat such things on their own :)
3) Aftertaste -- This tea was fragrant and spicy, redolent of cinammon, ginger and caradmom flavors. In this way, it was more similar to Indian chai than to any teas I've had in China.
The tea was a neat compliment to the folk dancing, though I wasn't tempted to order the series in any of Dali's cafes that offered to recreate the experience for 30 kuai minus the dancers.
Posted by Astrid at February 24, 2005 05:36 AM