It’s well known that China is the biggest coffee market in the world. And if you’ve been following this blog, you might recall my stories about new coffee experiences in China, like coffee cocktails, ready-to-drink coffee and dirty coffee.

During my recent trips, I met even more coffee innovators, so I thought I’d share some of the latest trends in a new blog post.

Coffee and tea: a perfect pair

Even though coffee is becoming super popular in China, it’s not really replacing tea as the national drink. Tea is still the top choice. But to be more accurate, coffee is just becoming a new kind of tea in Chinese tea culture. The Pu’er region in Yunnan province was the first place I saw coffee and tea blending together.

In October 2025, we took a tour around Jingdezhen, China’s ceramics capital in Jiangxi province. This area is also famous for its tea. But we had a really interesting coffee experience in a small village called Hanxi, where an entrepreneur had opened a fancy coffee shop right in the middle of the tea fields.

Besides the usual coffee drinks like espresso and americano, they also made coffee mixes with tea and other ingredients. We tried two special drinks: Apple by the Window and Pine Grove in Tea Field. They weren’t quite to our taste. They tasted mostly like coffee, but the tea flavour was hard to spot. The apple in the first one didn’t really go well with the coffee. The pastries were good, and the view of the endless tea fields was amazing. We chatted with the manager, who told us they’re planning to make even more variations and might even add Chinese wines. She had just come back from a trip to the wine region of Ningxia.

Coffee and wine: a bold combination

I came across this on Chinese social media about a visit to the Torch Coffee Farm in Pu’er, Yunnan. Torch Farm is experimenting with different coffee bean varieties, like roasting methods, to create unique flavours. The illustration shows some of their coffees during a tasting session, which is part of the tour. To me, the Merlot variety stands out the most. Torch Farm people compare coffee flavour variations to wine grapes. Interestingly, Pu’er has a sister city relationship with Libourne in the Bordeaux region of France. This was because tea experts in Pu’er noticed similar differences between tea and wine grapes.

These are fascinating developments that blend food science, business and culture. I’m sure I’ll be back soon with another post on this topic.

Peter Peverelli has been involved with China since 1975 and often travels to its most remote areas. He co-authored a major book that explores the cultural factors behind China’s economic success.