Seven “must” in daily living of Chinese people are expressed in a proverb often recited when people talk about their family budget:
“On opening the gate, there are seven matters you encounter:
fagots, rice, oil and salt, also sauce, tea and vinegar.”
Traditional social decorum has it that to every visiting guest a cup of tea should be served. A poem by Du Luei of Tang times shows an aspect of the function of tea:
“Guests coming in, in the cold, cold night I serve cups of hot tea in the place of warm wine”.

How to serve the cup of tea to a visiting friend differs in places. In Jiangsu and Zhejing provinces, a porcelain cup ora glass tumbler is used to brew Longjing, Piluochun, Maojian or just or dinary green tea. Chrysanthemum tea is sometimes used in hot summer season. During the spring festoval holidays, in the well-off families the guests may be entertained with Yuanbao tea (gold-ingot tea) to two fresh olives submerged in the tea to bestow blessings. In the countryside, when people visit relatives, they are usually served with “egg-tea”. In fact it is not tea but a bowl of pouched eggs, so called to show the publicity of the idea of tea.

Hosts in the northern provinces usually entertain their guests with a cup of scented tea, the kind very popular in the North China cities, while in the colder north-eastern provinces, the enthusiastic hosts would provide warm black tea with sugar added to ensure warmth.

In the coastal provinces Guangdong and Fujian, a pot of Oolong tea, congou tea or Pu-er tea is the usual treat. If you go to visit a family in the mountainous Xiushui County, you would be served a cup of “sesame-bean tea” (sesame seeds and baked beans scattered in the liquor which are to be chewed and swallowed on emptying the cup). Iced tea is even common in modern families as most homes are equipped with refrigerators.

Serving tea to guests is a common Practice among the 56 ethnic nationalities in China. But in the border districts different tea is used. In Mongolia, a guest is entertained with yogh art tea. In the Jingpo family, you would be given baked tea(tea in water and baked in an oven to make hot). There still have Leicha, Dayoucha, etc.