A Taste That Grows Even More When Enjoyed Together
If you have read this article, you would all know that the editor really likes Mala. While writing a Mala guide full of personal bias, I suddenly became curious about the taste of Chinese drinks sold at Mala Tang restaurants. There are several drinks, but I purchased and tried the most easily accessible ones: Chapai, Binghongcha, and Bingtangxueli.
Chapai
Chapai (茶π) is a Chinese drink that means offering unlimited tea to consumers. It comes in four flavors: citron, grapefruit, peach, and lemon. When I poured the lemon-flavored Chapai into a cup, it showed a clear and transparent yellow color. It blends fruit and tea to create a pleasantly sweet taste, with a fragrant aroma similar to herbs. The characteristic bitterness of tea is almost zero, so I think it is a flavor that hardly divides opinions. Especially, Chapai is non-fat and low-calorie, making it easy to enjoy without burden even after eating high-calorie Chinese food.
Binghongcha
Binghongcha (??茶), called Chinese iced tea, means ice-cold black tea. Compared to the Lipton iced tea most familiar to us, the color is similar but it has much less artificial sweetness. Thanks to this, it leaves no lingering aftertaste and feels clean. You can think of it as a drink similar to Starbucks’ grapefruit honey black tea but with less sweetness. This product contains 125 kcal.
Bingtangxueli
If you saw the yellow label of Bingtangxueli (?糖雪莉) and thought it was lemon-flavored, that would be a big mistake. When I opened the lid and poured it into a glass, the scent of crushed pear, similar to the Korean drink Tankboy, hit my nose strongly. This pear-based drink was mainly enjoyed by people with weak bronchial tubes in China. Just like how we protect our bodies by making steamed pear with honey when we catch a cold. It feels like a light ion drink without the puree from crushed pear. This product, which shows a very pale light green color, contains 220 kcal, the highest calorie among the three Chinese drinks introduced today.
Curiosity resolved!★
Photo by Yoon Eun-ae
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