Hello lovelies, the last few days have been really sunny and warm and so I have the perfect recipes for you: 4 delicious iced tea recipes. We love ice-cold drinks in summer and never run out of ice cubes in our household. Iced tea is of course one of our favourites because it is so refreshing. But have a look at the ingredients list on a bottled iced tea sometime, it is almost always far too sweet for my taste. That is why I am so pleased to show you, in collaboration with Migros Bio / Alnatura Switzerland*, four simple recipes for making your own iced tea at home.
Organic tea
The most important ingredient is of course TEA (and ice, but more on that later :-). I can only recommend using tea in organic quality. I want as few residues in my glass as possible, and I care about how and where the tea was grown. The organic label is the best guidance I have as a shopper.
And here they are – my four favourite iced teas to make at home. Just click through to each recipe:
1. Peach-melon iced tea
A refreshing iced tea with peach, melon and mint – fruity, light and just right for hot days. You can even blend the leftover fruit from the syrup into a quick ice cream.
Get the recipe: peach-melon iced tea
2. Cherry-lavender iced tea
My pick for warm summer evenings: sour cherry and lavender are a classic evening pairing, and this iced tea smells wonderful too.
Get the recipe: cherry-lavender iced tea
3. Wild berry iced tea
The kids' favourite: fruity wild berry tea, gently sweetened with date syrup, with fresh lime juice and plenty of frozen berries. So much better than any store-bought syrup.
Get the recipe: wild berry iced tea
4. Chai latte float with vanilla ice cream
Last but not least, my little star: a cold chai latte with oat milk and a scoop of vegan vanilla ice cream on top – it almost counts as dessert.
Get the recipe: chai latte float with vanilla ice cream
Which iced tea suits which occasion?
The peach-melon for hot afternoons, cherry-lavender for warm evenings, wild berry for kids and bigger groups, and the chai latte float as a small dessert.
The four are built differently on purpose. The peach-melon takes the longest because you cook a syrup for it, and it is the most aromatic of the four for exactly that reason. Cherry-lavender and wild berry are on the table in twenty minutes. The wild berry makes six glasses rather than four, which is why it is our recipe for a house full of children. And the chai latte float is the one I think of as pudding rather than a drink.
| Iced tea | Time | Makes | Per glass | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Peach-melon | 30 min | 4 glasses | 55 kcal | hot afternoons |
| Cherry-lavender | 20 min | 4 glasses | 45 kcal | warm evenings |
| Wild berry | 20 min | 6 glasses | 35 kcal | kids, bigger groups |
| Chai latte float | 20 min | 2 glasses | 180 kcal | dessert, guests |
Times, quantities and nutrition come from the four recipes themselves.
How do you make iced tea without sugar?
Let ripe fruit do the sweetening first, then add maple or date syrup only if the tea still needs it. None of these four uses table sugar, and the wild berry gets by on 1 to 2 tablespoons of date syrup for six glasses.
The trick is the order you do things in. Most recipes sweeten while the tea is still hot, which is when sugar dissolves easily and when you can taste it least accurately. Cold tea reads as less sweet than the same tea warm, so what seemed right in the pot disappears over ice. I brew, cool completely, taste, and only then decide.
Liquid sweeteners are the practical choice because they are the ones that dissolve in cold liquid at all. Granulated sugar sinks and sits at the bottom of the jug. Maple syrup is neutral enough to go with anything. Date syrup is darker and rounder, which is why it suits the berry tea rather than the peach one.
The fruit does more work than people expect. A ripe peach or a handful of frozen berries left sitting in the jug keeps sweetening the tea as it chills. That is why the fruit goes in early here and the syrup goes in last.
How do you keep iced tea from getting watery or bitter?
Against watery: freeze some of the brewed tea into ice cubes and use those instead of plain ones. Against bitter: lift the teabags out after the normal steeping time rather than leaving them in until the tea is cold.
The second is the mistake almost everyone makes. If the bags sit in the water while it cools, more and more tannins come out, and you taste them far more clearly in cold tea than in hot. Bags out after the steeping time, then let it cool undisturbed.
The first costs nothing at all. Ordinary ice cubes turn a good iced tea into a pale drink within twenty minutes. I freeze part of the finished tea in an ice cube tray instead, so the last mouthful tastes like the first. Fruit juice cubes work too if you like it a little sweeter as they melt.
Which iced tea is best for kids?
The wild berry iced tea. It is made with a fruit tea rather than a black tea, it is naturally fruity, and it makes six glasses rather than four.
It is also the one I sweeten least. The frozen berries go straight into the jug and keep colouring and flavouring the tea while it sits, so it needs very little syrup to taste like a treat. Serve it with a few extra berries and a slice of lime in the glass and it disappears faster than the other three.
The chai latte float is the other one children ask for, but that one sits much closer to pudding, so it is a weekend thing here rather than an everyday drink.
Making iced tea yourself is genuinely this easy, and with these low-sugar varieties you do yourself and your family a real favour. My favourite is the chai latte, but I also loved the cherry-lavender combination. My tip against watery iced tea: freeze some tea or juice into ice cubes so everything stays nice and flavourful.
If you are after more cool summer ideas, try my vegan mango and raspberry ice cream or the creamy orange coconut ice cream.
And if you want to stay with tea: my fruit matcha latte with strawberry and mango is the cold drink we make most often here. From the very same chai tea I also love baking chai brownies.
This blog post was created in collaboration with Migros, but reflects my own opinion.*
