Herbal Tea and Sweet Soups in Guangzhou: Liangcha, Tong Sui

What is liangcha?

Liangcha (凉茶, literally “cooling tea”) is a herbal drink from Guangdong. Despite the name it is not made from tea leaves. The national listing at ihchina.cn says people in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau developed it to suit their local climate, using traditional Chinese medicine ideas. The listing presents it as an everyday drink with its own traditional terminology.

This site makes no health claims. If you are pregnant, have a health condition or take medication, ask a doctor before you drink herbal tea.

Why is it a heritage item?

Liangcha was added to China’s first national list of intangible cultural heritage in 2006, under Guangdong Province, category traditional craftsmanship, project code Ⅷ-89 (ihchina.cn serial number 439). The entry traces the tradition to Ge Hong, a physician of the Eastern Jin dynasty who came to Lingnan in 306 CE and studied the region’s epidemic diseases. Later local physicians added to his work. It lists 54 formulas from 16 brands, among them Wong Lo Kat (王老吉), Sheung Ching Yam and Pak Wan Shan (白云山). The entry says tea shops closed during the Cultural Revolution and many items were lost, while the tradition survived in Hong Kong and Macau.

What kinds of liangcha will you find?

China Daily’s government channel says Guangzhou herbal teas fall into two groups: sweet teas and bitter teas. It names Bansha Liangcha (癍痧凉茶, per Newsgd) as a bitter black tea, and the brands Huang Zhenlong (黄振龙), Gengtiangong and Linshi. It also repeats a local saying that Guangzhou has more herbal tea shops than rice shops. The article does not list the herbs.

What this means in practice:

• A counter selling bottled or cup liangcha is easy to find. You can usually point at what you want.
• Ask for the milder one if you are unsure, and take a small first sip. Bitter ones are meant to taste bitter.
• Chains also sell a freshly brewed cup. The cover photo shows a 王老吉 shop counter in a Guangzhou mall, captioned 现泡凉茶 (freshly brewed herbal tea).

What is tong sui?

糖水 (tángshuǐ, “sugar water”) is the Cantonese word for sweet soups and puddings. Wikipedia describes it as a sweet soup eaten as a dessert, usually at the end of a meal, and in the narrow sense soupy desserts from the Lingnan region. It can be served hot or cold, depending on the shop and the dish.

Wikipedia’s vegan notes are inferred from ingredients and its own list says sweeteners and coagulants can differ between shops. Ginger milk curd (姜撞奶) is also common and is milk-based. For strict diets, the halal and vegetarian guide has more.

Where can you find herbal tea and tong sui?

These are the places named by official or state-media pages. Check hours on a map app, because the older figures may be out of date.

Jianggao Tongshui Street, Baiyun

The Baiyun District government’s English page, dated March 16, 2026, presents Jianggao Tongshui Street (江高糖水街) as a Cantonese dessert landmark with arcade buildings and more than 10 long-established dessert shops. It lists double-skin milk, red bean paste, black sesame paste and tortoise jelly among the traditional items. The page gives no opening hours or address, so look it up on a map app in Chinese before you go.

Tongfu Road, Haizhu

Newsgd, a Guangdong state-media site, wrote on July 12, 2019 that Tongfu Road is a traditional arcade street where time-honoured dessert, soup and herbal tea shops sit beside small restaurants. It gave the way in as Exit D of the Second Workers’ Cultural Palace metro station, at the start of Tongfu East Road. Its examples, with 2019 hours that may have changed:

• Fenfang Dessert: open 06:30–23:00, known for water-chestnut syrup, a sweet soup with egg drop and water-chestnut cubes.
• Wong Chun Loong Herbal Tea (黄振龙): open 10:00–22:00, selling herbal teas, including the bitter Bansha tea.

Xihua Road, Liwan

Goldthread’s July 17, 2019 article lists a black sesame soup shop, 芝麻糊世家, at 383 Xihua Road, where the sesame is hand-crushed and cooked for 20 minutes. Xihua Road is also covered in the street food guide.

How do you order and pay?

Point at the board, or use the table QR code if the shop has one. Say 不要太甜 (búyào tài tián) to ask for less sugar and 热的 (rè de) or 冰的 (bīng de) for hot or iced. Set up Alipay or WeChat Pay before you go; the payment guide explains how. For tea itself rather than herbal tea, see the Cantonese tea culture guide. For late hours, the nightlife guide is the place to start.

A simple plan for a first visit: try one sweet liangcha and one hot or cold tong sui, such as red bean or black sesame, and compare them with your usual drinks and desserts. No dated source gave a price for either.

Prices were not available from dated, reliable sources, so none are quoted here.