Southerners excel at numerous things, including making sweet tea. You can buy it by the gallon at the grocery store, but it tastes even better when you make it yourself. Check out this recipe for southern sweet iced tea, and then whip up a batch today.
Ingredients and Equipment for Southern Sweet Iced Tea
You don’t need many ingredients to make a batch of thirst-quenching sweet iced tea. You simply need the following:
- 12 individually sized black tea bags (or three family-sized bags)
- 1 cup of granulated sugar
- Ice
- Lemon slices or fresh mint leaves (optional)
Then, you need to get your equipment together. Just like the ingredients, you don’t need much in the way of equipment. Take out a small saucepan, a long-handled spoon, and a gallon pitcher.
How to Make Sweet Iced Tea
Once you have your equipment and ingredients, you’ll be ready to make the iced tea. Put four cups of water into a small saucepan and bring it to a boil. Once it boils, take the saucepan off the burner.
Then, dunk and remove the tea bags several times into the water until they are completely wet. Leave them submerged in the saucepan for five minutes. Also, make sure the strings are outside of the pan, so you can remove the tea bags.
After five minutes pass, take the tea bags out of the saucepan. Pour the sugar into the saucepan and stir it, and keep stirring until the sugar is dissolved.
Pour the tea into the pitcher and add three quarts of water to the mixture. Stir the water and the tea base together so it blends.
Put the pitcher in the refrigerator until it’s cold. You need to refrigerate it for a minimum of four hours. If you have the time, leave it in overnight so it can get nice and cold.
Then, take out your pitcher and have a glass of sweet tea. Serve it over ice so it will be authentic Southern sweet iced tea.
You can also add lemon or mint to the glass if you want a little extra kick. This is especially nice on a hot summer day.
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Making Stronger or Sweeter Tea
Do you like stronger tea? Add the sugar and tea to the saucepan at the same time. Stir the sugar as normal, and then keep the tea bags in the saucepan for three hours. Then, you’ll take out the tea bags and follow the rest of the recipe.
What if you like sweeter tea? After you put the tea in the pitcher, add another quarter cup of sugar. Next, mix it up and taste it. If it still isn’t sweet enough, continue adding more until it’s just as you like it.
Sweet iced tea usually goes quickly, but you can store it for approximately one week as long as you keep it in the refrigerator. Make a batch, throw it in the fridge, and get ready for sweet iced tea, Southern style.
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