Many moons ago my first posting out of meteorology school was to a remote hamlet in the extreme northwestern corner of B.C. For a ‘city boy’ it was an education (not to mention culture shock) to find myself living 3 hours by gravel road from the grocery store and 10 hours from the closest mall!
During my two years in Dease Lake I learned an awful lot about myself and to a lesser extent cooking, mostly from a transplanted couple from Texas – Tom and Christina Miller. Tom taught me how to build a log house – with over 300 logs it was a wee bit more than just a cabin! And Christina showed me how to whip up a feast from just about anything in the cupboard (or the river that flowed past the front door).
One of the specialties of the house was Christina’s homemade Iced Tea – strong and sweet in the true Texas tradition. To this day Brisk® or any of the bottled Iced Teas in the market are ‘thin beer’ compared to her Iced Tea and you will usually find a jug chilling in my fridge from the beginning of April until Thanksgiving.
Christina’s Texas Iced Tea
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 to 2 litres of boiling water
- 6 – tea bags
- 1/4 cup Sugar
- 3 tbsp Lemon Juice
Instructions
- Put the water on to boil.
- Fill your 1 1/2 – 2 litre Iced Tea jug with hot water and set aside Important
- When the water is boiled empty the jug and put the tea bags in the bottom.
- Fill with the boiling water and cover.
- Let steep for a good quarter hour.
- Add the Sugar and Lemon Juice.
- Stir and cover again.
- Let stand until cooled to room temperature and put in the fridge to chill.
- The tea will last about 3 – 4 days covered in the fridge until it begins to turn.
- Don’t worry about cloudiness – that is from the Lemon Juice.
Quick Notes
- You can substitute up to 2 of the tea bags for flavoured tea bags (raspberry is quite nice!).
- If you are using loose tea one heaping teaspoon is about the same as a tea bag (but a bit messier to remove from the jug!).
- You could substitute Green Tea for regular Tea but I would avoid the herbals as they turn bitter quickly in the fridge.
- Lapsang Souchong is wonderful tea hot but packs a serious wollop when chilled – avoid unless you have a cast iron stomach or lots of Tums handy!