Serving

Iced Tease: Mouthwatering Recipes for Days to Come

There are a million articles out there about iced tea. This one has simplicity in mind, since cabin fever barely had a chance to set in before Spring sprung, and back out onto sunny patios we gleefully go.

    Let's tackle just a few points here:
  • 1. simplest iced tea recipes
  • 2. which teas make great iced teas
  • 3. common dilemmas (too weak, tea clouding)
Summer lovin', here we come
Summer lovin', here we come

1.Making Iced Tea is easy. The simplest method may be to prepare as directions require, and chill until ready to drink. Alternatively you might make a concentrate; use more tea, a double or triple dose, and steep as instructed. You can now dilute to strength with cool water or ice. Easy!

For both these methods, I recommend allowing the hot brew cool to room temp before refrigerating to prevent stressing your fridge and "shocking" the tea and causing it to cloud from cooling too quickly (more on this later). If intent on sweetening your tea, add sugar or honey while the tea is still warm.

Adagio has a few teas and wares to make this even easier. In our own shops, we offer all of our 100+ teas both hot and iced and employ our 16oz IngenuiTEA teapot for both preparations. When using this nifty teapot for iced tea, we simply add the appropriate quantity of leaf, but only fill up 2/3 full. When steeped, we fill the rest up with ice, and pour into a cup also filled with ice. Easy as pie.

If interested in more voluminous brews, our 32oz IngenuiTEA is excellent for making iced tea concentrates (chai, too!).

We also have pre-portioned pouches of loose tea for 1 quart and 1 gallon brews that can be tossed into a larger commercial brewer. Check these out here: Adagio Foodservice Iced Teas

2. Which teas make great iced teas? This is a trick question. They all do.

    Ginger Peach
      Grapefruit
        Passionfrui
          White Pear
            Peach Oolong
              Mango Honeybush All great. Toasted Sesame might not be my first choice, but I bet it pairs delectably with something...I encourage you to experiment.

              3. Common dilemmas.

              Iced tea is too weak.
            • If your concoction is too weak, you can check a few places. The usual culprit is not-enough-tea. If you're serving over ice, brew stronger than usual to accommodate the extra soon to be water. Some teas, hibiscus herbals, for example, taste better a little stronger when cold than is necessary when hot. Even though you'll be serving cold, tea still needs to be steeped in hot water to prepare. Tea leaves are dried at high temperatures, and high temperatures are required on unlock the flavors within. Lukewarm water will give you mediocre hot tea and flavorless iced tea.

              If using a commercial brewer and whole leaf teas, your brew cycle might be too short. Some quick brewers run a super short cycle that basically runs water over the leaves with no retention time. Teas designed for these systems are harsh, finely cut, and usually doused with flavor additives to compensate for the lack of brew time. If you want to offer a boutique or gourmet tea, ask the manufacturer or your rep about setting the parameters to allow the leaves more contact time with the water.

              • Iced tea is cloudy.
            • Lucky you! Studies link this phenomenon to high levels of theaflavins (the modern day cure-alls, antioxidants) and their reaction to being cooled too quickly, or "shocked". Your tea is probably very fresh and brimming with theaflavins! Why this happens only in some teas, only some of the time, seems to have to do with a number of possible factors, including the tea's origins, freshness, as well as water mineral content. It has absolutely no impact on the taste of the cup. It is rather unfortunate, then, that our expectation is for iced teas to be crystal clear. We're robbing ourselves of delicious and healthful experiences.

              Still, as purveyors, we are subject to customer perception. The best prevention is to allow the tea to cool before putting in the fridge or pouring over ice to prevent shocking. If you've got clouds in your tea already, try adding a smidge of very hot water (no more than a cup per gallon) to help "reset" the brew. Alternatively, a slice of citrus disguises as well as it pairs with a nice cool glass of iced tea.

            Fresh Cup recently ran a great article on the issue of tea clouding.

            For further reading or icy inspiration, check out these articles from Adagio colleagues:
          • Making the Perfect Iced Tea by Cynthia Fazekas and Christine Rillo
          • Iced Tea (Or How I'll Spend My Summer Vacation by Chris Cason