Thai Iced Tea

Me and my hubby...or is it, my hubby and I? Well, we went to a really good Thai restaurant that served iced tea. It's not the iced tea that Americans usually drink here in the U.S. It's a darker, richer kind of tea and they serve it with some sort of sweetened milk. Thai iced tea has such a unique flavor. I asked the waitress how it was made and she said it's just tea with milk! Well this didn't taste like tea with milk, so it must be some special kind of tea and some special kind of milk!

I did a little research recently because I've been wanting to duplicate that Thai iced tea.
I read lots of recipes on the Internet and found that some people like to use  Thai tea bags. And others use black tea like the black tea they serve in Chinese restaurants. Some recipes called for spices like star anise and cardamom. Also many recipes used sweetened condensed milk, sugar and/or coconut milk to sweeten the iced tea. My head was spinning trying to think of how to make Thai iced tea!

Then I just decided to take the plunge and try this

 Thai Iced Tea from a blog called

 Oh Abby Day 

It was very good, but I know it would have been better if I would have used Thai tea bags instead of black tea! I added 6 drops of red food coloring because Thai tea is much more red in color than black tea. I'll be trying this again with the proper tea next time!

 

Ingredients:

4.5 cups of water
4 tea bags of Thai tea (if loose leaf then 4 tablespoons). Must be purchased at Asian supermarket.
4 tablespoons of white sugar
4 tablespoons of sweet condense milk
ice
3-4 tablespoons of coconut milk

Instructions:

Bring water to boil and turn oven off.

Steep tea for 10-15 minutes and remove. (I usually steep for a much longer time because you need this strong!)

While this is still hot, mix in sugar and condense milk. Stir for three minutes until everything dissolve.

Allow tea mix to cool down to room temperature.

Pour mixture over a glass of ice

Topped with 3-4 tablespoon of coconut milk. No need to mix in the coconut milk. Let it sit on top of the drink.

Optional: Can garnish with mint leaves.

 

Recipe courtesy of  'Oh Abby Day'

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Update: February 26, 2013

 

I'm so happy to say that I have an update!

A very kind and generous fellow foodie named Stella Reynoso from the 'Stella Reynoso Photograhy' and food blog, sent me a large supply of her Thai Iced Tea bags! I was able to brew up another batch of the above Thai Iced Tea recipe using those tea bags! And let me tell you...WHAT A HUGE DIFFERENCE in the taste and even in the color! No red food coloring needed this time! The flavor of the Thai tea bags was so much more strong but so much more smooth. It reminded me of a really lovely pipe tobacco...if that makes sense! So aromatic and full of tea flavor. But not anything like black tea or orange pekoe. Just a very unique tea flavor!

 

Thank you so much Stella! I will only be using Thai iced tea bags to make my Thai Iced Tea  from now on! It's so worth the trip to the Asian food market for this tea!

 

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