Just because the weather is warm outside (unless you’re in the southern hemisphere, then have a Hot Toddy for me!), that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy some nice tea. Heck, in the American South, you get the magic of sweet tea. Growing up, my mother would put out a glass pitcher full of water and various teas to make sun tea — just add ice and sweetener and you’ve got your very own sweet tea. Now that I’m grown up, I want to have my tea and drink it too. (That almost makes sense.) Seriously though, it’s time to upgrade your admirable daily tea habit to an occasional tea cocktail, but not just any tea cocktail, the Scarlet Tea Cocktail!

Yeah, having an English degree, I couldn’t help but smile at the name “Scarlet Tea Cocktail.” I mean, yes.

Anyway, as we figured that most times you’re drinking a cocktail, it’s at the end of the day and you’re looking to relax, we knew that we didn’t want caffeinated tea. We needed herbal tea. That’s why we looked no farther than our friends at Rishi Tea and their Scarlet blend (based on rooibos, which gives it a fruity, floral aroma with hibiscus, blueberries, cherries, orange and a few other tasty organic, fair trade ingredients) for our base.

What I didn’t want to do was disguise the tea flavor — making cocktails and cooking food are both about celebrating ingredients, not hiding them. So, starting with the dominate blueberry and cherry flavors that I was getting from the Scarlet blend, I selected components that I knew would work well with it.

Then it was just a matter of the grand theme of the cocktail. Yeah, I know, “grand theme of the cocktail.” I feel like a bit of a ponce saying it, but there it is. I mentioned that I have an English degree, right? Everything happens for a reason! There aren’t accidents!

Essentially, what I’m saying is, when I drank the tea, I asked myself, “What does this make you feel? Where are you?” The answer: I’m somewhere tropical.

When it comes to tropical, one alcohol calls out to me over all of the rest — drum roll — rum! I knew we didn’t want to go with a dark and funky rum, while lovely, that’d take over the tea. However, a white rum didn’t bring enough character so, golden rum.

Knowing that, it was just about finding the right proportions and dialing in the tropical tea cocktail experience.

Now get out there, get some tea, make yourself this cocktail and transport yourself somewhere tropical.

Time to get our Scarlet Tea Cocktail on!

 

June 16th, 2015 | by morgan