One of my favorite things to drink is iced tea. I love it! In fact, I have a gallon iced tea container in my fridge all year, not just in the summer. But for those hot summer days, nothing quenches my thirst like a big, frosty glass of iced tea.
I wasn't always a sweet tea drinker. For years, I drank unsweetened tea. I liked it, it was good, all was well with the world. It was my standard drink to have at a restaurant (and no, it wasn't LONG ISLAND iced tea...I stopped drinking those at Geddy's with my Alpha Phi sisters!) Anywho...unsweetened iced tea was my drink of choice...until I moved to Georgia in 1995/96. I went out to eat with my newlywed husband and ordered iced tea...and surprise, surprise, I got a glass of sweet tea! It was so good! So sweet! But so much sugar! I tried to replicate it by ordering unsweetened iced tea and stirring in endless packets of pink or blue sweetener, but it just wasn't the same. I bought sugar free iced tea mix and it was OK, but not the same as that Georgia sweet tea. I just kind of gave up on sweet iced tea and saved the sugar version for a once-in-a-while treat.
Fast forward to last summer. I began to experiment with making sweet tea with Splenda. I tried, tried and tried. We had gallons of tea that were OK, not OK, kind of OK and finally I managed to get it right. So enjoy my version of sweet tea. Feel free to replace the Splenda with sugar, if you're so inclined...or even mix half sugar/half Splenda!
Jen's Sweet Tea
2 One gallon sized tea bags (I use Lipton...I buy them at Sam's Club)
1-1/3 c. Splenda
scant 1/2 c. lemon juice (just a little less than half of a cup, but a little bit more than 1/3 of a cup!)
Place ingredients inside an empty gallon container (I got mine at Walmart.) Fill to the top with cold water. Refrigerate and serve! It will take about an hour to be ready.
That's it! No boiling, no sitting it in the sun,
Enjoy~
There is nothing better than sweet tea =) I haven't added lemon juice so I'll have to try it. I sometimes put fresh lemon verbena in mine for the lemon flavor!!
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