I happened upon a how-to website the other day (and I’d put the link here, but this blog-publishing site isn’t very user friendly, even to a computer genius like me), and while looking up info on beer brewing, I noticed a link titled “How to Make Sun Tea”.
“Hmm…sun tea,” thought I, “That brings back happy memories of when my Grandma used to set a pitcher of water out on her back porch and I’d periodically check on it to see when it was ready.” So, since I like my Grandma, tea, and using the word “periodically”, I figured I couldn’t go wrong in trying my hand at brewing some sun tea of my own.
Thanks to reading the book The Tea Companion, by Jane Pettigrew and our recent forays to The Tea Source and Teavanna, I’ve become somewhat of a tea snob. I know, I know, I was already a snob in the first place, but I think “snob” is a term requiring subcatergories: am I a car snob? No. Am I a beer snob? Computer snob? Film snob? Telescope snob? Yes, yes, yes and yes. In fact, my wife even points out (correctly) that I am a Map Snob (I’m thinking of starting a Yahoo Group for other map snobs).
My first task was to find a large container appropriate to the task. I wanted it to be made of glass (see? -snob), and to have a spigot on the bottom. We serendipitously found a very stylish number at a store in Highland Park (more snobbiness). The store was going out of business, so everything was 40% off the original price. So we purchased this very classy looking container; it’s a far snazzier thing than the barrel-shaped/plastic-handle number I recall from my youth.
Anyway, with Owen’s ‘help’, I filled it with water, added some tea bags and set it out on the deck table. We checked on it (periodically, of course). Here’s what it looked like four hours later…
At any rate, the tea turned out find. Some alarmists warn that you shouldn’t make sun tea because strands of rope-looking bacteria grow in the heat of the sun, and this can make you very sick. But I did more research and found out you can avoid this by A) periodically ensuring the container is clean, B) using filtered/bottled water only, C) not leaving the tea out in the sun for more than six hours and D) discarding any tea that does have “ropes” hanging from the surface of the water.
The container is rather large and unweildy, so don’t ask me to bring some to your house (should I be invited). Instead, feel free to periodically come on over and try some straight from our snobby kitchen!
Cheers!