Lemon and Mint Iced tea is a Popular refreshing Summer drink that is made by combining a ubiquitous and all-appealing Indian beverage tea with lemon and mint and served chilled with lots of ice to cool you down in soaring mercury and heatwave conditions.
Historical references suggest that Iced-Tea is as American as a Hamburger and is quite a popular beverage choice among Americans, in fact Wikipedia claims this figure to be as high as 80%. Most countries in the world have still not taken to this fanciful way of drinking tea (at least not as open heartedly as Americans), and still prefer the conventional way of brewing hot tea. In India, we too not only prefer our tea hot but love it when its spiced with Indian Spices-Ginger, Cardamom, Cinnamon to name a few.
Iced tea, had attained huge popularity in America since early 1900s. Though the historical references point to the existence of this drink much earlier in history, but the credit for popularizing this drink must go to a Gentleman by the name Richard Blechynden. During a particular year of 1904 in the event of St. Louis World’s Fair Richard Blechynden was trying to impress the fair-goers by serving them free tea samples. However, for his misfortune, sun was particularly unkind and harsh on that day. Nobody came near to trying the hot tea that he was offering in the blistering heat and Richard grew desperate. As luck would have it he started offering hot tea in glasses cooled with ice and the plan worked. His drink was a hit and people flocked to his counter in search of respite in form of a iced tea. This act of desperation had popularized Iced-Tea from then on.
In India, with increasing globalization, iced tea has become hugely popular and it forms part of many café menus. Sensing the opportunity, Nestle and Lipton sell iced tea as a bottled beverage for an easy on the go option.
Making your own iced tea at home is far too easy and the entire process may take less than few mins (excluding refrigeration time). Lemon and Peach are the two most preferred options of iced-tea.
In this blog post, keeping with our weekly tradition of posting one recipe of cool summer beverage, here we are back again with this recipe of Lemon-Mint Iced Tea. Click on the links below to know what other drinks have we posted this summer.
Cold Coffee with Ice-Cream
Roasted Aam Panna
Coffee Almond Ice-Cream
Kokum Sherbet
Piyush
Masala Chaas
Mango Lassi
- 4-5 tsp Tea Leaves
- 2-inch Cinnamon Stick
- 8-10 Mint Leaves
- 1-inch Ginger root (grated)
- 2-3 tbsp lemon juice
- 7 tbsp Sugar
- 5 Cups Water
- Heat 5 Cups Water in a Pan. Add Grated Ginger and Cinnamon Sticks and allow water to boil
- As water begins to boil, lower the heat and simmer for a min. Add Sugar and Tea Leaves. Mix well and switch off the heat. Strain after a min.
- After a min, pass through a sieve. Add Mint leaves and let the tea come down to room temperature
- Remove the mint leaves.
- Add lemon Juice (2½ tbsp) and mix well.
- Keep the bowl aside, and let's do the fun part. Pour Iced tea in a Ice-tray to make some ice-cubes. Put in some mint leaves.
- Put ice-tray in freezer section and put iced-tea in refrigerator.
- Serving:
- Put lot of ice-cubes. Pour in Iced-Tea. Add lemon slices. Put some more Ice-cubes. Iced-Tea is ready to be served
- You can store Iced-Tea in a refrigerator. So, whenever you want to sip on some iced-tea, pour it in a glass put lots of ice and enjoy.
- Tip of the Day: How to extract more juice out from a lemon
- We often buy lemon in a large quantity during summers and store it in refrigerator. However, if we try to extract juice from lemon stored in refrigerator, it doesn't produce desired amount of juice.
- a) Place the lemon inside a microwave for 30 seconds on High Power
- b) You can also put the lemon inside warm water for 5 mins
- This makes the lemon soft and it will produce more amount of juice.
Click to watch recipe video
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