If there's one thing that we have a lot of here in the
Mojave, it's sun. Sun tea lets us harness that raw awful blistering force and turn it into something yummy and refreshing.
Sun tea tastes different from traditionally prepared iced tea. It's got a smoother taste and more of a crisp "brisk" flavor, that kind that you taste at the back of your tongue that makes you want to smack your lips and go, "Ahhhhhhh."
Jon's Super Sun Brew
Ingredients:
2 quarts of filtered water
5 bags of good English Breakfast Tea (I prefer Twinings)
1 bag of genmai-cha or failing that, any mid-range green tea
1 or 2 bags of the herbal tea of your choice. (My choice is raspberry zinger).
Honey (optional)
Method:
Pour your filtered water into a large clear container, preferably one with a lid to keep things from falling into your brew. Take your 5 bags of breakfast tea and give them a twist so that all their strings twist into one big string.
Submerge the tea bags in the water, making sure that they get wet and sink. Next, throw in the herbal tea bag(s). Cover, and put out in the sun for 3-4 hours. Bring your brew back inside, and remove the tea bags (but don't discard), and pour in honey, if you'd like. Toss in the genmai-cha tea bag, replace the other tea bags, and reseal and put back in the sun for one more hour. Since genmai-cha is a little bitter, you don't want to have it in there the whole time, unless you like bitter nutty tea.
Now, fish out all the tea bags, recover, shake, add lemon if you so will, and serve over ice. Enjoy the complicated irresistible flavor, and attempt to not drink it all in one go.