Cassia wine

Cassia wine,[2] osmanthus wine, or Kuei Hua Chen Chiew is an alcoholic Chinese drink, sometimes sweetened, produced from weak baijiu and flavored with sweet osmanthus flowers. It is distilled, but typically has an alcohol content less than 20%.

Osmanthus Wine
Bottles of cassia wine
Chinese	桂花酒
Postal	Kuei Hua Chiew
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin guìhuājiǔ Wade–Giles kuei-hua-chiu
Cassia wine
Chinese	桂酒
Postal	Kuei Chiew
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin guìjiǔ Wade–Giles kuei-chiu
Kuei Hua Chen Chiew
Traditional Chinese	桂花陳酒
Simplified Chinese	桂花陈酒
Literal meaning	Osmanthus Reserve
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin guìhuā chénjiǔ Wade–Giles kuei-hua ch'en-chiu

A dessert made of Nu Er Hong and Kuei Hua Chen Chiew Cocktail Jelly

While the plant itself is sometimes associated with cinnamon,[1] the blossoms' lactones impart a flavor closer to apricots and peaches.[3]

Owing to the time at which Osmanthus fragrans flowers, 'cassia' wine is the traditional choice[4][5] for the "reunion wine" drunk on the Mid-Autumn or Mooncake Festival.[6] From the homophony between 酒 and 久 (meaning "long" in the sense of time passing), cassia wine is also a traditional gift for birthdays in China.[7] It is also considered a medicinal wine in traditional Chinese medicine.[8] Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica credits sweet osmanthus with "curing the hundred diseases" and "raising the spirit".[9]

Within China, cassia wine is associated with Xi'an[10] and Guizhou,[1][11] but production now occurs throughout China, including Beijing[12] and at the Hong Jiang Winery in Hunan.[13]

Despite the name, the Chinese cassia tree is not used to flavor cassia wine. References to the osmanthus in Chinese literature and poetry are often translated as "cassia" because both trees were formerly known in China as 桂 (Modern Standard Mandarin: guì).