"iced tea" news and stories

Fruit salad. Photo: TiffanyWashko/Flickr

• When bright summer fruit is in season, make desserts like shortcake and cobbler without fuss.
• The three rules for succulent summer cocktails, plus a few recipes.
• Probiotics might seem great, but experts say the term is misused and misunderstood.
• Starbucks gets a new store that is both environmentally sound and modern.
• Nicaraguan coffee farmers will ease picking pains via new ergonomic baskets.
• Strawberries get a new mode of transport by sailing to Seattle.
• Four steps to a tasty homemade iced tea.
• Anthony's Fish Bar offers fish and chips in the summer sun, and GreenGo Food loves local nibbles.
• Recipes: Leftover Bread and Tomato Salad, Pucker Up P'Sghetti, Crunchy Peanut Butter Ice Cream, Chili Spice Rub with Orange, Caramelized Little Tomatoes with Linguine, Summer Salad with Blue Cheese and Dill, Roasted Eggplant Salsa, Grilled Strip Steak with Olives and Feta, and Pasta Salad with Smoked Chicken and Oven-Dried Tomatoes.

Quality iced tea (i.e. iced tea made from quality loose leaf tea) can be confusing because it's made in different ways by different people. I've been reviewing teas for several months now, and even I haven't been sure of the best way to make iced tea until very recently, when I finally decided (through necessity of the hot weather) to try it on my own.

The first thing you should know is that you should not make sun tea. This is a long-used method of throwing the tea in a pitch of water and then letting that pitcher of water sit out in the sun... at exactly the perfect temperature to breed bacteria and potentially make you sick.

Yes, your grandmother's made it since you were a kid or your mother says it's fine, but trust me. Sun tea is a bad idea, and even if it weren't, there is very popular method of making iced tea that eliminates any need to leave your tea in a jar out in your yard all day.

Most trade shows are the stuff of, if not nightmares, then at least a sleepwalk from one charmless kiosk to the next. Not so at the 54th Summer Fancy Food Show, where 20,000+ gourmet retailers, restaurateurs, chefs, media folks and plain ol' food fans spend three days chomping their way through a fever dream of some 180,000 specialty foods. The throwback "Fancy" is a bit of a misnomer by now, as there's a very wide slice of products on offer, ranging from swankity wines, oils, cheeses and caviar to humble chewing gums, ketchups, chili seasonings and snack mixes.

Here are my first day favorites from the more wallet-friendly end of the spectrum. More thorough reviews will follow, but I've gotta recover from hauling around a 21lb* shoulder bag of collected samples and press releases first.

Of course, I'm not talking about the ways you try to keep cool in general, such as cranking the AC, jumping into a pool, or going to the beach. I'm talking about liquid refreshment.

There are many schools of thought on this. My mom used to drink hot coffee in June, July, and August, going by the old theory that drinking hot liquids in hot months actually cools you down. I myself like iced tea and ice cold water during the summer, with some diet soda and icy Ocean Spray Light Ruby Red here and there too. Others seem to like beer and cocktails, though I really doubt their effectiveness (beyond the initial hit of cold liquid going down).

After the jump, give us your liquid solutions for the summer. Besides the drinks above, I'm thinking about asking the owner of the liquor store down the street if I can live in his giant walk in fridge for the summer..

How do you like your iced tea? What I mean is, do you like real brewed iced tea or do you like the stuff from the store, with all the sugar and lemon?

As I think I've mentioned here before, I can't stand real brewed iced tea. It just seems like, well, I got a hot cup of tea and I let it sit on my desk for a couple of hours and now I have to drink it cold. And no matter how much sugar and/or lemon I add, it just doesn't have the same taste as the packaged Lipton or Nestea.

Anyway, June is National Iced Tea Month. I drink more iced tea in the hotter months of July and August, but since June marks the start of summer I guess it's a logical time to have the holiday (holimonth?). AOL Food has some great iced tea ideas, including tips on making the best iced tea, reviews of iced tea, and even an iced tea quiz.