Lemon Iced Tea – The Woks of Life

This lemon iced tea is the right, refreshing beverage for a celebration, outside occasion, or simply to maintain within the fridge! It’s frivolously sweetened (however not too candy). And it has nice lemon taste that’s balanced by an additional ingredient—the juice of a pair candy clementines! 

The Seek for the Good Lemon Iced Tea

Me and iced tea go approach again. When fountain drinks have been nonetheless a factor that I’d bask in each on occasion (positively a mark of the 90s for me), my go-to was at all times both Brisk lemon iced tea or no matter peach/raspberry tea they’d on provide.

It was SO candy, I watered it down a bit of, whilst a child! I used to be first confronted with the quantity of sugar that will need to have been in that 20-ounce cup once I was at a T.G.I Friday’s with a hankering for iced tea. They solely had unsweetened. “Simply put some sugar packets in it,” my aunt informed me. Effectively, I did…and it appeared like irrespective of what number of packets I threw in there, it simply wasn’t candy sufficient. 

Clearly, my sugar tolerance has modified fairly a bit since my neon-leggings-wearing, cartoon-watching 9-year-old days. However my love for iced tea hasn’t! 

This lemon iced tea recipe hits all the correct notes for me. It tastes like a more energizing, more healthy, WAY much less candy however nonetheless soul-satisfying, thirst-quenching model of the Brisk of days previous. It’s frivolously candy and lemon-forward with out being bitter or bitter. 

I believe the bottom line is the addition of the juice of a pair clementines. (You could possibly additionally use mandarin oranges or tangerines, or perhaps a very candy orange). Consider it as getting the flavour of a elaborate meyer lemon (a sweeter, much less acidic selection) with out paying that meyer lemon price ticket! 

A Staple for Entertaining

This iced tea has turn out to be a go-to for me for summer time entertaining as a result of: 

1. It’s a serious crowd-pleaser. Everybody loves it! 
2. I could make it at residence with substances I typically have available
3. It doesn’t produce the waste that canned and bottled drinks do. 
4. And eventually, it by some means feels extra particular for visitors once you current them with a pitcher of selfmade iced tea. I is probably not from the South (the place candy tea reigns), however I really feel like even my frivolously sweetened model simply has the vibe—of less complicated instances, heat hospitality, and welcome. 

Lemon Iced Tea Recipe Directions

Add 4 cups of scorching water and tea luggage to a lined container. Enable to steep for 1 hour. Alternatively, add cowl tea luggage with 4 cups of room temperature water and steep within the fridge in a single day. 

Tip!

I wish to brew iced tea in a medium pot or saucepan (or perhaps a stockpot if I’m making an enormous batch). Convey the water to a boil within the pot. Throw the tea luggage in, cowl the pot, and that’s it. No kettles, no batches within the scorching water boiler. You don’t want a number of containers for boiling/brewing, and also you save on dishes to do!

Stir within the lemon juice, clementine juice, and agave nectar.

Pour into glasses over ice, and add lemon slices.

Serve! 

FAQs

What sort of tea do you employ for iced tea?

This may be a bit controversial, as there are such a lot of nice teas on the market, however my selection for selfmade iced tea is nice ol’ bathroom commonplace Lipton tea luggage.

A lot of the iced tea all of us get pleasure from is made with black tea, and you might select any black tea mix you want. However I discover that Lipton simply has that basic, acquainted taste that I’m searching for in a glass of iced tea. I don’t purchase their particular “iced tea” mix or something like that. I simply purchase their commonplace tea luggage (natural if they’ve it).

They’re extensively obtainable, economical (which is particularly nice should you’re making large batches of tea for a celebration!), and I simply assume they’ve the correct taste notes.

Funnily sufficient, my dad and mom and I have been as soon as on a tour of a tea farm in China that produced 红茶 (hóngchá), which interprets to “purple tea” (that is what the Chinese language name black tea). The very best high quality complete dried tea leaves have been QUITE costly. Once we requested concerning the totally different grades and value factors, the tour information informed us that the small damaged bits of leaves and tea “mud,” i.e. their lowest grade tea that wasn’t match on the market within the fancy canisters, was truly offered to…you guessed it. Lipton. For me, this got here off extra constructive than damaging. If I used to be getting Lipton tea mud from a farm that additionally offered tea for 100 RMB a field, it didn’t look like a nasty deal!

Ought to I exploit chilly or scorching water to brew iced tea? 

Many tea connoisseurs say that chilly brewing iced tea is extra excellent than brewing it with scorching water, because the tea has a cleaner taste with much less bitterness. I say that in case you have the time and forethought, go for it! It eliminates that further step of boiling water, however you simply must have sufficient time for it to steep. 

That mentioned, I typically whip up this iced tea on the identical day I plan to serve it, and I simply use scorching water. I don’t discover it to be noticeably extra bitter, and it’s a important time saver.

If I don’t have agave nectar or honey, can I simply use sugar? 

Agave nectar is my most popular sweetener right here. You don’t want very a lot of it (it’s truly a lot sweeter than sugar and a bit of sweeter than honey), disperses rapidly within the tea, and it has a clear taste. You may as well use honey, although that can positively add an additional taste dimension. 

Should you’d like to make use of sugar, dissolve it in an equal quantity of scorching water earlier than including it to your iced tea, otherwise you’ll simply get a bunch of sugar settling to the underside of your glass/pitcher. I’d use 3 tablespoons of granulated sugar dissolved in 3 tablespoons of scorching water to get the equal stage of sweetness right here. After all, you can too modify the quantity of sweetener to style!