Longan Herbal Tea Recipe

I've always loved to order 'liang teh' or 'herbal tea' when dining at Chinese restaurants. Love the lightly sweet and honey-like aroma. The kids call it Coke for some reason. Sanju is always quick to grab and finish my cup of nicely iced liang teh, I always make sure I order one for each of us.

Been eager to try the recipe but it is kind of hard to imagine the kind of ingredients or herbs that went into it. In fact it sounded rather alien when I actually learned of it, via FB cooking group, thanks to a fellow group member who was kind enough to explain it via pictures.

Firstly you need Luo Han Guo, which looks like this:

Initially I was so puzzled, like where would I find anything like this? Maybe the traditional Chinese medicine shops, but during my routine trip to the market, I found this lying in front of me, with my other usual stuff, right in my favourite grocery store! How could I miss it? 

Then as the drink suggests, some dried longans, and they look like this:

These, again, were easy to find in my local store as well!

And then, some white/snow fungus:

It goes without saying, this white fungus, and the next rock sugar, were both easily found in my local store. I felt like I had won the lottery or something.

So I rushed home, brought 8cups of water to a boil. Added some pandan leaves.

I washed the ingredients (not the sugar yea) with water. Slightly broke the luo han guo, broke the white fungus into smaller bits and give them a nice soak. Once the water was boiling, in goes the luo han guo, dried longan, white fungus and the rock sugar. It took about 40-50 minutes of boil to get the white fungus and dried longan all nice and soft. Once the heat is off, you can take the luo han guo and pandan leaves out. Chill it before drinking!

As with any food, the hardest part is letting it cool down. It felt like ages. While it was cooling down I got some into my tumbler, put it into the fridge to expedite the process. And soon enough I found myself digging into ice cubes, and gulping down nice chugs of liang teh, that came with longan and white fungus to chew on!

This definitely beats the heat we are facing recently, thanks to El Nino. El no no, drink some luo han guo!

Images courtesy of Google Images