Salad · Fermented Tea Leaf

Lahpet Thoke

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Northern Thailand has its own fermented tea, miang, but it's chewed as a wrapped snack; Myanmar's lahpet is one of the few tea preparations eaten as a full salad.

Fermented tea leaves are tossed with fried garlic, toasted sesame, crunchy split peas, peanuts, tomato, and chili, traditionally kept in separate piles so diners can mix their own combination. It's sold as a snack from street stalls and served as the closing course of home meals alike.

Why it's made this way: Fermenting tea leaves for eating rather than drinking is believed to have started in Myanmar's Shan State, a major tea-growing region, and a lahpet tray was historically exchanged as a peace offering between warring parties.