what is bubble tea?

Proper sweet tea is made not with sugar, directly, but with simple syrup, which is sugar dissolved in water. It took me a while to learn to order unsweet tea and then sweeten it myself.

dmh

Well, sure. If you like tapioca (it's on my short list with eggplant and asparagus.)

Iced tea is more complicated than that.

Of course, there's the standard "iced tea", which is a black or blended tea. Luzianne, which I have to have shipped to Minnesota from Kentucky, is a blend of teas made just for iced tea. This is, of course, unsweetened.

But if you go into just about any restaurant in the U.S. "South," you'd have a choice between "iced tea" and "sweet tea." The latter is already heavily sweetened with sugar (not syrup).

Then you can add flavors. Raspberry iced tea is one of my favorite flavored teas. Of course, these are almost always sweetened. However, I've found that I can make a pretty good raspberry iced tea using our standard, unsweetened Luzianne from the refrigerator and adding about

1/3 cup of a sugar free raspberry beverage that my wife likes to drink.

Then, of course, one could go to the Good Earth restaurants and one has a choice of several unsweetened varieties of Iced Tea. Their "standard" iced tea is heavily spiced and I actually don't like it. Their China Black iced tea is what the wife and I order.

But, after thinking about it, there are probably only 3 major styles - straight, sweetened, and flavored. But when my brother-in-law asked for "sweet tea" in a Two Harbors, Minnesota restaurant, the waitron gave him the blankest of stares.

Pepsi Co. and Coca Cola are selling billons of dollars of carbonated beverages in China. Are they consumed "unchilled" there?

I ask because in 1993, I discovered that warm Coca Cola was actually pretty good, since the Russian family with whom I was living thought drinking chilled Coke was nuts.

I really do wonder if that last "reason" has more to do with it than a lot of other reasons.

"Proper" is just another word for "pretentious." ;)

I guess my family and nearly all of the southern region of the USA has been making improper sweet tea for generations.

Quotes himself:

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Vg'f shaal ubj Nzrevpnaf ner ivrjrq va gur jbeyq nf pynffyrff naq jvgubhg phygher fvzcyl orpnhfr jr qb fbzr guvatf qvssreragyl, ohg gur erfg bs gur jbeyq vfa'g ivrjrq nf cergragvbhf sbe guvaxvat gung gurve jnl vf pbeerpg naq gur bayl jnl, vfa'g vg?

heh. I love irony.

Mydnight

-------------------- thus then i turn me from my countries light, to dwell in the solemn shades of an endless night.

I think it's decent to drink it from time to time. I don't think I've had the tea version of it before; always in some kind of juice or chocolate milk.

I don't know if influenced or originated would be the correct way of looking at it.

Smaller town kids, maybe, still view it as odd because their parents don't drink much of anything iced or cold. It may have something to do with the clean water conditions, but it's more to do with the Eastern style of medicine based on hot and cold. There is a major exception when it comes to Beer and other alcholic beverages, though. Beer is nearly always served cold or chilled.

It can make for some interesting discussion. I recall being bombarded by some of the more elderly folks in a small Sichuan town that drinking too much cold water (on a 34 degree summer day) can be bad for my health. I would often buy bottled water in small shops.

"Too much cold water, bad for your health!"

Nestea is huge in China. Nearly the only coffee widely available is the Nescafe powered form unless you go to a coffeeshop. And, then it's even more fun to watch them brew the coffee because many shops have these odd looking apparatuses that resemble a chemistry set when brewing coffee. As for nestea itself, it is only readily available at small stores and grocery stores; not at all in the bags like we have it in the US.

When I bump over to Taiwan in the summer, I'll definitely check it out. I may be calling you and asking for directions. heh.

Mydnight

-------------------- thus then i turn me from my countries light, to dwell in the solemn shades of an endless night.

I don't know that "proper" is the issue...I'm not from the US South and I don't drink much iced tea...having said that...

simple syrup goes into a cold liquid a whole lot more thoroughly than granulated sugar...ever try to stir in a spoonfull of sugar in iced tea and see it swirling around in the bottom of the glass? (That MAY be the point to using granulated though, since when you do it that way, you have to put in more sugar and then when you drink to the bottom you get this shot of really sweet tea at the end....)

Melinda, who thinks iced Moroccan Mint green tea is swell.

I was teasing about the use of the term "proper," you know.

Y'all need to think outside the cup. ;)

Yes, for individual use, sugar doesn't dissolve worth a plug nickel in a glass of iced tea. The last drink ends up being horribly sweet because the sugar at the bottom finally dissolved but never got stirred up.

But when one is sweetening it by the pitcher, one can add sugar straight to the freshly steeped tea which is, after all, hot enough to dissolve the sugar.

Oooh. That sounds good!

I think I'll have to head to the southern states to check out all those varieties of iced teas. Sounds great!

I still get asked all the time in China if I want my beer cold, like it's not the default option. Something I've never gotten used to.

Down here, as Derek said, we usually sweeten the entire pitcher while the tea is hot, or actually while the tea is still boiling on the stove.

Mydnight

-------------------- thus then i turn me from my countries light, to dwell in the solemn shades of an endless night.

Where are you in China exactly? I've never been offered to have my beer served warm. heh.

Mydnight

-------------------- thus then i turn me from my countries light, to dwell in the solemn shades of an endless night.

Actually, in all my "years", I'd never heard of making a syrup for sweetening tea by the glass. I'll admit it makes sense, but it's not something I'd ever seen done. Then again, I only lived in the South for 6 years. The previous 18, I traveled through it with family frequently.

Then again, Alton Brown of "Good Eats" has a recipe for Sweet Tea on the FoodNetwork site that includes making a syrup. And he typically knows what he's talking about - even if he is actually a bigger geek than I am.

Having worked as a Restaurant Manager in my younger years I can attest to the fact that making a "syrup" was indeed commonplace. We used to fill a 2qt pitcher full of sugar and then add enough hot water to dissolve it. One pitcher of syrup was enough to sweeten one of those tall SS Iced Tea decanters. I have also seen some high end Deli's that only served unsweetened Iced Tea but made their own syrup to put on the table, it really does mix tremendously better than granules. Unsweetened Iced Tea also has a longer shelf life as the sugar could easily lead to fermentation if left at room temperature which is all too often the practice.

Mike

On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 18:57:50 -0600, Derek cast caution to the wind and posted:

Mike Petro snipped-for-privacy@pu-erh.net

remove the "filter" in my email address to reply

Again, there's no argument that a sugar syrup dissolves more readily.

But what a restaurant does is not necessarily what millions of people do in their homes. After all, there's a lot of things that restaurants do to food, such as placing it under a heating lamp, that a common household chef would not do.

As for the shelf life... a) it's iced tea so it's supposed to be kept cold. B) if your sweet tea is sitting around long enough to ferment, you're not a true southerner. ;)

I never implied that millions do it, I was just backing up the fact that it is indeed fairly common. It is not confined to just restaurants either, I know of many housewives who do the same thing, my Mother-In-Law for example. I personally only make unsweetened iced tea as I like it without sugar. I make a syrup for guests and serve it in a honey type squeeze bottle. And yes, in my house the pitcher is kept in the frig and seldom lasts more than a meal period.

As for keeping Iced Tea at room temperature you will notice that I disagree with the practice when I said "all too often". Nonetheless it is extremely common for restaurants to do so. I have often tasted sweet tea that started to ferment and it takes less than day to do so when sugar is added to hot tea and allowed to sit around all day. There have been several studies that have shown that restaurant sweet tea often has unsafe levels of bacteria. The machinery they use actually encourages it. Those tall Bunn Iced Tea brewing machines that will brew 3-5 gallons at time are typically left out on the counter and not refrigerated.

Mike

On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 22:19:23 -0600, Derek cast caution to the wind and posted:

When it comes to food safety, we are often our own worst enemies. It's not the meat packing plants, it's our own kitchens.

I've heard of a study, but have not seen it, that tested counter tops and floors. The floors had less bacteria than the counter tops.

Sugar syrup is used when mixing certain alcoholic drinks. This method promotes even mixing. I daresay it is used when even mixing is desired.

My wife is from South Carolina and tells me she "brews the sugar in." I am not sure what this means, but I believe it has something to do with getting even mixing of the sugar. Also, many southerners lament the inavailability of "sweet tea" in the North. One surefire way to make many southernes I've known order a Coke is to offer them sugar packets and unsweetened tea when they wanted "sweet tea".

Given what others have said, it appears there is no consensus on the matter of whether sugar syrup is proper or not.

Steve

I spent my preteens on the Gulf Coast. My mom would only use Sugar Cane from Lousiana granulated or syrup for tea and cooking. These days I only drink unsweetened tea hot or cold. If I did use sugar it would be sugar cane for tea. The taste is completely different than refined sugar.

Jim

Steve Hay wrote: ...fairy dust...

No debate on that here.

In my experience, "Brews the sugar in" means that the sugar is added to the water before steeping. I've seen people add sugar to cold water before putting the kettle on the stove, and I've seen people add sugar to boiling water just before adding the tea.

Right. It's the word "proper" that bugs me. It just reads "snooty."

The ultimate goal is the quality of the final product. There are times when a sugar syrup is best, and times when it's not necessary.

Always lovely, but if you 'boil the sugar in it,' it should be fairly even anyway.

She means you can add the sugar either before it steeps or while the water is boiling.

Mydnight

-------------------- thus then i turn me from my countries light, to dwell in the solemn shades of an endless night.