Covered-Cup Eight-Treasure Tea

Covered-cup eight-treasure tea, also called the Hui "three-piece tray," uses a lidded cup of saucer, bowl and cover, holding green or spring-tip tea with jujube, wolfberry, longan, raisin, walnut, rose and rock sugar among its dried and fresh fruits; steeped in boiling water, the liquor is sweet and brimming with fruit fragrance.

Covered-cup tea is an emblem of Hui food culture, bound to the custom of welcoming guests with tea. Yinchuan sits in the heart of Ningxia's wolfberry country, so local jujube and wolfberry abound, and eight-treasure tea became the essential brew of Hui homes and halal restaurants for hosting guests and pairing with hand-gripped mutton.

Brewed by pouring boiling water high and steeping under the lid, one first inhales the lid's fragrance, then sips the tea and finally eats the softened jujube and wolfberry left in the cup; taken beside the mutton to sweeten and cut the fat, it is the highest courtesy of a Yinchuan host.

The three-piece lidded cup, the sweet freshness of its eight ingredients and its tie to Hui hospitality make Yinchuan eight-treasure covered-cup tea irreplaceable.