Buy me some of this and I will love you forever!
OK.
There is something that I have had on my mind for a while now and I just need to share.
In fact, I can’t get it out of my mind because it is so freaking beautiful.
Yes.
It’s a tea.
The weird thing is, I have never even tasted it, but I just know that one day when I finally do it is going to be so freaking good!
[This post is part of The Ultimate Iced Tea Guide series]
As I am writing this post I am chilling in the garden, it’s the summertime, the dog is happily running around, the sun is beating down on my legs, and life is good. What makes it extra good is the fact that I am sipping on some Green Iced Tea with Jasmine, Apple and Honey. It’s cooling me down, and it’s natural. What could be better?
What I am trying to do here with this series about iced tea is show you how easy it is to enjoy iced tea when it is too hot to drink hot tea. Plus it can be a much healthier and more natural option, especially if we are talking in terms of reaching for a soda. Don’t get me wrong, I love coca-cola as much as the next person, but there is a huge sense of wellbeing in drinking something that has been cheap to prepare, is 100% natural and contains way less sugar!
This tea is a super tasty and refreshing green iced tea. It was certainly a hit in my household, and from the feedback it was particularly floral and refreshing. The flavours in here really compliment each other, and the honey brings a subtle and natural sweetness which pulls everything together.
This tea is extremely easy to prepare, the recipe is as follows:
This is me at a beautiful tea room in Berlin.
Tea is the tastiest when it is shared with people that you love, and this trip to the Tadjikistan Tearoom in Berlin, was amazing quality tea, with amazing quality people.
I have the feeling that tea rooms like this are pretty rare, but I am determined to seek out more of them. This tea room was seriously special, with floor tables, beautiful pillows and fabric, pillars, and the most amazing teaware, each tea was served in a pot and cup to compliment it perfectly.
Right now I am on a very pleasant an relaxing break in Spain. That is why you haven’t been hearing from me so much!
I have been away for a week now, and I am feeling a bit deprived when it comes to tea. You see, for a start it is too hot to drink tea here, it’s beautiful sunshine. I have had such huge urges to make iced tea, but unfortunately it has not been easy finding loose leaf tea, which, as far as I am concerned is one of the Iced Tea Essential Items! Cold brewing how I miss you!
Anyway, enough about iced tea. Today, the hottest day of the holiday so far, we spent the morning browsing an awesome Spanish market. There were stalls of all kinds, but I especially enjoyed the food section of the market. There was a huge selection of tasty looking fresh produce, here are a couple of photos to give you a flavour:
[This post is part of The Ultimate Iced Tea Guide series]
As with many new things that we try in life, often we can be either forced or compelled to shell out a big outlay on buying new equipment even before we have dipped our toes in the water.
What I find with situations like this though is that often I either already own adequate equipment, or that it is possible to purchase simple equipment very cheaply so that I can test the water before going to whole way and shelling out a lot of cash for my new hobby.
I think that this is definitely true when it comes to iced tea. There is lots of cool equipment out there that can be very tempting as it is either extremely beautiful or extremely functional, or in many cases both!
I will be looking into some of this very funky and fancy teaware in future posts, however, for someone who is perhaps just making iced tea for the first time and wants to experiment for a while before making an investment in advanced accessories, or indeed someone who is simply wanting to make iced tea on a budget, you will probably have most of the iced tea essential items that you need in your cupboards already, and if not will easily be able to purchase them for under $10.
During my tea tasting adventures I haven’t spent much time with the much loved Chai Tea variety.
This is OK, because there is plenty of time. But I feel that soon I am going to have to do more research and tasting when it comes to Chai Tea.
Last week I came across something that really inspired me both when it comes to drinking Chai Tea but also just simply surrounding tea culture in general.
I am so excited when I see people getting involved in tea culture, promoting tea culture and making tea culture. An artist that I came across recently, Lucy Knisley, is someone who falls under that category.
The first piece of her work that I ever saw is the image below which is her household Chai Tea Syrup Recipe in a beautifully illustrated piece of art. Truly awesome.
It has really inspired me to experiment with Chai Tea. So thank you Lucy!
[This post is part of The Ultimate Iced Tea Guide series]
I am extremely excited to be doing this series on Iced Tea at the moment. Not only is it a relatively new area for me that I am enjoying exploring, but also it’s just perfect because we are having some wonderful weather here in the UK right now. There couldn’t have been better timing for brewing lots of experimental iced teas at the moment to bring you some fantastic iced tea recipes.
Something that I am becoming increasingly interested in is local produce. In fact at the moment I am doing a lot of research and thought into the Locavore lifestyle.
Recently I took a fun day trip to a “pick your own” farm nearby and picked some beautiful berries. The strawberries got eaten pretty quickly, but I decided to puree and freeze the raspberries for a later date. Their fate became evident when a couple of days ago I was cold brewing some green jasmine iced tea. With the beautiful flowery flavour of the jasmine tea I knew that raspberry puree that I had in the freezer would be the perfect combination.
Here is the recipe for my Green Iced Tea with Jasmine and Raspberry
[This post is part of The Ultimate Iced Tea Guide series]
As we begin this series about Iced Tea I want to first talk a little bit about basic brewing for Iced Tea.
Obviously when you are brewing regular tea that you are going to enjoy warm, you would brew it hot and normally only steep it for anything between a few seconds and a couple of minutes depending on what type of tea you are brewing.
Cold brewing iced tea is a different kettle of fish, but is going to be crucial if you want to enjoy the perfect iced tea!
