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Making iced tea at home is very simple and requires very few ingredients and tools, in addition to the added value of being able to use your favorite tea choosing between the stronger taste of Indian black teas, the more herbaceous and fresh taste of Japanese green teas, or the more delicate white teas, and being able to enrich it with different flavors and aromas.
You will not miss the lemon or peach iced teas from the supermarket: by using these traditional methods, you will enhance your tea, extracting it in the most correct way and obtaining a tasty, healthy drink that retains all its properties and that can be an excellent base for creating personalized drinks. Often, mistakes are made in preparing homemade iced tea that result in a bitter drink that loses all its properties and flavor notes. In this article, we reveal how to prepare iced tea with three different methods to obtain a genuine, natural drink that does not change its taste notes over time, an infusion extracted in the most correct way, to sweeten as desired and enrich with fruit or flavors.
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The cold infusion, or cold brew method is perhaps the most correct way to prepare iced tea. The recipe for iced tea with cold infusion is very simple and allows you to obtain an infusion without sugars, rich in properties, which can be stored for a long time in the refrigerator and contains much less caffeine than the corresponding hot extraction. Especially in black and green teas, cold water tends to extract much fewer catechins, polyphenols, and caffeine than hot water, resulting in a much less tannic, astringent, and bitter infusion, sweeter. Let's see how to prepare iced tea with cold infusion:
The method of preparing cold tea with cold infusion is the most correct way to make this beverage at home, allowing you to sweeten it to your liking with sugar, honey, or agave syrup. It can be stored in the refrigerator for a long time and enriched with different ingredients, such as lemon slices, peach pieces, strawberries, or other fruits, as well as herbs and spices.
The Japanese method of preparing cold tea, called Kōridashi or ice cold brew, is widely used in Japan for the cold extraction of the finest green teas. It is a technique that can be used for various other teas to prepare a high-quality homemade cold tea, low in caffeine but rich in antioxidants and beneficial properties. With the Kōridashi method, tea is extracted directly using ice cubes instead of water. Here's how it works:
The tea prepared with the koridashi method can be stored in the refrigerator for a couple of days.
This Japanese method is highly recommended for the finest green teas, especially Japanese ones like Gyokuro tea. Extraction with ice enhances the sweeter notes of these teas and maintains the typical umami taste that characterizes them. You can discover different green teas and choose your favorite in the section dedicated to green teas on Terza Luna.
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We know that preparing cold tea with hot infusion, to then cool it in the refrigerator is a wrong method, as beverages extracted hot according to specific temperatures and infusion times must be consumed immediately. Making cold tea by brewing it with hot water, letting it cool down at room temperature or in the refrigerator, causes the drink to tend to oxidize (this also applies to coffee and herbal teas), losing a good part of its organoleptic properties and altering the sensory notes. Cold tea made from a hot infusion that has been cooled will have a more bitter and astringent taste, often leading to the addition of a lot of sugar to mask the unpleasant taste.
However, there is a method to prepare cold tea starting from a hot infusion, which involves rapidly cooling the tea using ice cubes, and must be consumed immediately. So, if you desire a cold tea instantly and do not have the patience to wait for the hours required for cold brew tea infusion, you can prepare your cold tea following this infusion method, also known as "taiwan style", precisely because it is widely used in Taiwan. This method is also ideal for quickly preparing cold tea in bars and establishments. Let's see how to do it at home:
Remember that this cold tea prepared from a hot infusion is meant to be consumed immediately, so you can savor all the original organoleptic notes of the tea. With this method, the amount of leaves used in the infusion is increased, so you have a more concentrated tea that can be diluted with ice without becoming too watery. Due to the high concentration of tea, the infusion may be more bitter than usual, so it is important to be careful to dilute it correctly: not too much, so as not to make it bland, but not too little to require large amounts of sugar. Thanks to the hot infusion method, it is possible to obtain cold tea in a few minutes, but it must be consumed immediately: we do not recommend storing it for a long time, as the taste will tend to change and become more bitter.
Many people are fond of lemon and peach teas that are available in stores, even though these drinks are often rich in sugar, preservatives, and artificial flavors. You can use one of the methods we have indicated for your customized peach or lemon tea recipe, using healthy ingredients and sweetening it to taste with a healthier sweetener such as honey or agave syrup. Simply prepare the infusion according to your preferred method, and enrich it, at the time of serving, with lemon juice and slices of the citrus fruit for the lemon tea, or add diced peach to the infusion for the peach tea, which can also be prepared by blending a peach and adding it to the already cold tea, remembering to strain it before serving. Using the same method, you can prepare a strawberry iced tea.
In general, cold brewing tea allows you to maintain the taste, sensory, and beneficial properties of the drink unchanged. Cold brewing is advisable, as it allows you to slowly extract flavor and properties from the tea in a less aggressive way compared to hot extraction. This ensures that even the most delicate and pleasant aromas are obtained during extraction, giving our homemade cold teas a unique and unmistakable taste.
Furthermore, the cold brew method for preparing 100% natural homemade cold teas without sugars "extends the life" of our teas. Cold tea can be prepared and stored in a carafe or bottle in the refrigerator for two to three days. You can flavor your cold tea at the time of infusion, or prepare a simple base to be enriched with fruit, lemon slices, fresh mint leaves, or ginger at the time of serving.
Now that you know all the secrets to prepare a great homemade cold tea, you just have to choose which type of tea to use. The great advantage of preparing a DIY cold tea compared to buying one already made from various industrial brands is precisely the ability to ensure the quality of the ingredients used, to prefer a premium loose leaf tea over tea bags, and to make the infusion in the most correct way to enhance the taste of the leaves.
Tea bags, as we have reiterated several times, are not only a major contribution to pollution, but they are often packaged with low-quality tea, tea processing powder, and waste. Choosing a high-quality loose leaf tea over tea bags for preparing your homemade cold tea will guarantee the taste and beneficial properties of this drink, and will give you the opportunity to create your own customized blends.
Any type of tea, from the most delicate and natural white teas that pair well with different combinations, to green teas, and even black teas, can be prepared using the cold brew method. We can range from flavored teas to pure teas, giving space to creativity and creating blends with herbs like mint, spices, dried fruit, or fresh fruit. We can easily prepare at home lemon iced tea or peach green iced tea, the two classic flavors of this cold beverage, using quality ingredients and making an infusion without added sugar.
But not only that, even our favorite herbal teas and infusions can be prepared cold. In this regard, we have recently published a mini guide on how to make cold brew herbal teas.
Homemade iced tea made with cold extraction or ice extraction method can be stored in the refrigerator for even several days. It is very important to use the right precautions to ensure that the iced tea lasts longer while maintaining the taste and beneficial properties that characterize it. It is important to:
Obviously, it depends on personal tastes, but it is advisable to prepare iced tea without sugar, for three very simple reasons. Firstly, because we are all aware of how sugar - especially refined sugar - is not beneficial to our health. Secondly, we suggest never adding sugar to your teas to feel the true flavor of the leaves. Finally, adding sugar significantly shortens the life of your iced tea. However, if you desire a sweet iced tea, we recommend adding sugar or your chosen sweetener (such as maple and agave syrup) only at the end, directly into the glass, just before drinking it, as adding sugar during extraction and putting the infusion in the fridge carries the risk of the drink fermenting and therefore going bad quickly.
