Tea....sweet or not to sweet.

I like Luzianne tea...and while I only drink my coffee sweetened (I use Sweet-N-Low, or the generic equivalent) I can drink tea either with or without sweetener. If we go out to eat, I'll order plain tea and put artificial sweetener in it myself, since I don't like sugar in my tea...or I drink it plain. Since most restaurants charge $2 or so for tea, which is ridiculous IMO, we usually just get water to drink. At home, we make iced tea plain, and my wife adds Splenda and Lemon to hers, by the glass. No lemon for me, although I do like lemonade.
 
I use a gallon jug of water & put a family size tea bag & sometimes a few sticks of cinnamon for an added kick. Let it sit out till it gets dark & strong so it'll stand up to the ice, then bring it in & let it get to room temperature before refrigerating. Works for me!

Some of the best sun tea I ever made and drank used to be made in two half gallon jugs left over from Old #7, Jack Daniels.

Perfection personified.
 
TEA = hot or not...I like it straight............no additives for me...
 
ICED TEA

Not a fan of the liquid diabetes. I order 1/2 sweet (1/2 sweet, 1/2 unsweet), or a 1/2 sweet Arnold Palmer, 1/2 tea, 1/2 lemonade. Living in the south now, some of that sweet tea will make your tooth hurt.
 
GKC mentioning what tea costs in restaurants reminds me of a guy I used to work with. The guy could stretch a penny till it snapped;I'm telling you he was Cheap! He also drank gallons of iced tea. One time he went into a Chinese restaurant & ordered an entree that was $3.99. Tea was $1.50. He was happy because he figured he would get out for under six bucks, including his usual twenty five cent tip. Did I tell you he was Cheap? Periodically his waiter would stop by his table to check on him, & he would order more tea. When he was done he asked for his check, & they gave him a bill for $12.99! He hollered for the waiter, who told him "your entree was $3.99, you had six glasses of iced tea at $1.50 each, so $12.99 is your total". You have to understand that this was about twenty years ago, so it was a pretty big price for a meal in a Chinese restaurant. I bet he has never forgotten;I obviously haven't!
 
I have a cup of orange peco with a teaspoon of honey every moning. but with meals I like straight plain ice tea.

I believe you mean, "pekoe" which is a CUT of the tea leaves, very common in the industry. If you are buying a better brand, the box will usually tell you where the tea is from, and that tells you the specific flavor characteristics. For instance, tea from Darjeeling in NE India is often lighter liquoring than from Assam, also in NE India. Twining's Darjeeling and their Irish Breakfast blend are prime examples of each.

But the blend varies with the company. For a Darjeeling, I prefer Taylor's of Harrogate's fuller blend from Darjeeling. The US importer will sell by mail, if need be. My gourmet grocer only stocks their English Breakfast on a routine basis.
They also make Yorkshire Gold, which is excellent.

I think Twining's Irish Breakfast has a little more delicacy and refinement than Taylor's Assam blend, marked as such.
But in some other regional blends, Taylor's is more to my taste. Overall, my favorite tea is probably a good Ceylon from the Dimbula growing area.

More and more restaurants make poor coffee, so I tend to order iced tea when eating out. I am alarmed at how many younger people don't drink coffee. Maybe they've never had a good cup. And they are marketed to like sweet soda drinks, even sweet alcoholic drinks.

I was amused years ago when at a college journalism convention in Chicago, a waitress asked my drink order. I ordered tea, which came hot and in a cup. It was what I wanted, but one girl in our group had never seen hot tea. She thought I must be weird to like it.

I drink more hot tea than iced. Just get iced in restaurants, often where their coffee is terrible. But I drink both with sugar, occasionally honey.

I do sometimes drink a herbal tea, Rooibos from South Africa. I've had several brands; Twining's was the best .
If you want a non-caffeinated drink at night, it's good for that. It has a nice flavor with citrus overtones.

I plug Twining's teas so much on the Net that they ought to be paying me promotional fees. But I like some Taylor's blends very much, too. Both offer excellent tea. Twining's, est. in 1706, holds the Royal Warrant as supplier of tea to HM Queen Elizabeth II and Buckingham Palace. Taylor's (estb. in 1886) holds the Royal Warrant as supplier to the Prince of Wales. (The Prince of Wales is the heir to the throne.) Both blend excellent teas.
 
GKC mentioning what tea costs in restaurants reminds me of a guy I used to work with. The guy could stretch a penny till it snapped;I'm telling you he was Cheap! He also drank gallons of iced tea. One time he went into a Chinese restaurant & ordered an entree that was $3.99. Tea was $1.50. He was happy because he figured he would get out for under six bucks, including his usual twenty five cent tip. Did I tell you he was Cheap? Periodically his waiter would stop by his table to check on him, & he would order more tea. When he was done he asked for his check, & they gave him a bill for $12.99! He hollered for the waiter, who told him "your entree was $3.99, you had six glasses of iced tea at $1.50 each, so $12.99 is your total". You have to understand that this was about twenty years ago, so it was a pretty big price for a meal in a Chinese restaurant. I bet he has never forgotten;I obviously haven't!

I ate in a Chinese restaurant that also charged for refills. And the owner came out and looked at every dish on the table, to be sure the waitress had listed it. I never went back.

I also ate only a few times at an Indian restaurant that even charged for bread! Most of their stuff was too spicy for me, anyway.
 
Don't you know your history???

Definitely sweet tea, whether it is "allowed", or "not meant to be". I don't remember any tea laws being passed. I like to make sun tea. I use a gallon jug of water & put a family size tea bag & sometimes a few sticks of cinnamon for an added kick. Let it sit out till it gets dark & strong so it'll stand up to the ice, then bring it in & let it get to room temperature before refrigerating. Works for me!

Google the "South Carolina Tea Riots". These nearly broke out into full rebellion the first part of the last century. It resulted in the passing of the "Tea Proclamation", which was somewhat unilaterally introduced but was later signed into law.:D:D:D


My Mom had the strangest way to make tea. She would put about 8 Lipton tea bags in an old teapot of water, then go lie down. When the tea boiled over on the stove somebody had to run and take it off the burner. Then my Mom would pour it in a pitcher, add a full teacup of sugar and water until the pitcher was full. People from all around raved about my Mom's iced tea and we would just look at each other and laugh. It seems that a rolling, foaming boil was just the right time for tea to reach maximum flavor.
 
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I like unsweetened tea myself but can drink sweet tea if that is what my host offers. Not a problem for me, I like my coffee black too after all!
 
I also ate only a few times at an Indian restaurant that even charged for bread! Most of their stuff was too spicy for me, anyway.

When I was in Tripoli, Libya all the Italian restaurants charged everybody for items....it you wanted camel butter, the rest of the group got charged for camel butter whether they had it or not.

Must say most of the food was excellent and not all that expensive, but a unique way of charging for items.
 
Refills are the norm

I ate in a Chinese restaurant that also charged for refills. And the owner came out and looked at every dish on the table, to be sure the waitress had listed it. I never went back.

I also ate only a few times at an Indian restaurant that even charged for bread! Most of their stuff was too spicy for me, anyway.

When I was in NYC they charged for refills because bums would come in and ask for a cup of coffee or whatever, then sit there for hours getting refills.
 
Not this fat boy.I despise sweet tea. Like mine like I like my women -dark and bitter with a squeeze of lemon

That's the reason I said.. "Most".

Always have an exception.. But, in you're case it just maybe "exceptional".. in a very good way!:D
 
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