Popular San Francisco-based restaurant Burma Superstar launched a product line inspired by its fermented tea leaf salad and created jobs for Burmese farmers.
Customers stand in line for hours to taste the popular fermented tea leaf salad at the San Francisco-area Burma Superstar restaurants, known for Burmese homestyle cooking. Inspired by the salad's cult following, the restaurant’s owner launched Burma Love Natural Foods Co. so fans could re-create the salads at home from its laphet (fermented tea leaf dressing), laphet aioli, salad kits and crunchy salad topper. To source the best tea leaves, the company goes to northern Myanmar (Burma) where it works with local farmers and has created a farmers’ co-op that allows Burmese tea farmers to work in their home country year-round, rather than having to travel to other countries to find work.