Guangdong Morning Tea

Drinking fine tea over delicious snacks is a supreme treat for Guangdong people. They like to do in teahouses during the morning.  Locally known as "one cup of tea and two snacks," the morning tea is regarded by the Guangdong people as "a joy of life."

Teahouses in Guangdong serve various kinds of teas and famous Guangdong-style snacks. The tea includes black tea, green tea, Oolong tea, jasmine tea and Liubao tea. The snacks include steamed buns stuffed with diced grilled pork, diced pig fat and sugar, minced pork, shrimp or crab meat, steamed dumplings with the dough gathered at the top with various fillings; and all kinds of flaky cakes. Before going to work in the morning, drinking a fragrant pot of tea and relishing the delicious snacks in a teahouse, proves a most relaxing experience. In recent years, with business burgeoning in Guangdong Province, people like holding business talks in teahouses. In Hainan Province, the practice has reached the extent that you can not enter the business circles without frequenting a teahouse. Drinking tea for business purposes has become a peculiar way of life in Guangdong and Hainan provinces, although it is far removed from the Chinese traditional purpose of tasting tea.


Unlike those in Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces, and in northern provinces, Guangdong teahouses provide breakfast for customers. Called "morning tea" by Guangdong people, it evinces the importance of tea at breakfast. Today Guangdong-style morning tea has gone beyond Guangdong and Hainan provinces and found its way into large hotels in Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai, although patrons do not number as high as those in Guangdong.