What is Sweet Rice Green Tea?

If you've ever tried our Sweet Rice Green Tea (糯香綠茶), one of the first things you may notice is its aroma.

It smells similar to freshly steamed glutinous rice.

But here's the surprising part:

There isn't actually rice in the tea.

The signature aroma, nuò mǐ xiāng (糯米香), comes from an aromatic herb traditionally used in Yunnan (雲南) tea making. Its fragrant leaves can be blended with tea—including green tea—to create that distinctive, soft, comforting, sticky-rice-like aroma.

It's a flavor that's difficult to describe until you've smelled it yourself. That unusual aroma is also part of what makes exploring tea from different regions so interesting.

I first tried this type of tea when I was traveling in Yunnan back in 2013. Yunnan is one of China's most famous tea-producing regions. On that trip, I tried different teas that were popular in the region, and what stayed with me were the flavors and aromas that I didn't even realize tea could naturally have.

That experience made me appreciate just how broad the world of tea really is.

Among those flavors, the aroma of nuò mǐ xiāng was especially memorable.

Years later, when we were choosing teas for Tea Again, I kept thinking about that idea.

We didn't want our tea selection to consist only of flavors people already recognize. Jasmine green tea and black tea will always have their place, but throughout Asia, there are so many interesting teas, regional ingredients, and traditional flavors that rarely make their way onto an American boba shop menu.

Sweet Rice Green Tea is one of the teas that represents that for us.