Tea for your Chinese Wedding

If you are planning a Chinese Wedding Tea Ceremony, one question you may have is “Which tea do I use?”

{and no, I’m not talking about Earl Grey or PG Tips!}

Chinese wedding tea should be sweet {as marriage is sweet; of course!} Ensure the tea is not bitter in taste and is at the correct temperature. Yellow rock sugar tea with a little Chinese tea leaf is perfect.

In boiling water, melt the lumps of rock sugar {available at all good Chinese supermarkets} then taste the sweetness, followed by pouring it into your Double Happiness tea pot with the leaves. This of course is really simple and straight forward for making your Chinese ceremony tea.

However, on your wedding day, the last thing you will be doing is making and tasting tea beforehand! So ensure you have someone dedicated to do the job. At a recent wedding I was co-ordinating, I was in the hotel kitchen making the tea whilst everyone were having their photographs taken with the lovely bride and groom. Immediately after the photographs, the bride and groom had their Chinese Tea ceremony. After the tea ceremony, the Father of the Groom asked me “What type of tea was it? It was incredibly tasty!”

I have also been curious to find out which tea is most popular for weddings in Hong Kong. So, I contacted The Wedding Company. Michelle very kindly told me

“For the Chinese Tea Ceremony, we don’t have any preference for a specific type of tea. Something without leaves preferable (leave that in the teapot), not too bitter and not too strong and not too burning hot to the lips. You should have a pot of hot water and a bottle of mineral/distilled water to cool it down just a little. We often add a couple of spoons of sugar in the teapot so the tea is just very slightly sweet, Chinese elders like that (for good luck and sweet marriage). Jasmine tea would be a good choice”

So remember, the tea is to be sweet {but not sickly sweet!} and to have someone dedicated to making the fresh tea for you to give to your elders… Carms x