Sweet Tea for Dummies

Hello, I'm Melissa, I was born in the Deep South, but I can't make a decent
pitcher of brewed sweet tea.

My mom makes the best sweet tea but when I asked her for the recipe, she said
"Boil your tea bags, let it steep for a few minutes, and add sugar and stir."
Thanks Mom but when I make tea like this it is either A. weak as colored water
or B. thick and strong like motor oil. GROSS. So to make drinkable tea, I have
used instant tea from Aldi, which isn't half bad but it certainly doesn't have
the flavor of brewed.

Luckily for my tea drinking family, I got the new Southern Living magazine earlier in the week and in it was a feature on tea with 28 different recipes including the basic Southern Sweet Tea. Is it sad that I needed actual measurements and cooking times to make
sweet tea?! I made a pitcher immediately and it was pretty good. The recipe is
now in my recipe box. When I get more confident in my tea making abilities,
I'll try my mom's vague recipe.

Ingredients
3 cups water
2 family-size tea bags
3/4 cup sugar
7 cups cold water

Preparation
1. Bring 3 cups water to a boil in a saucepan; add tea bags. Boil 1 minute;
remove from heat. Cover and steep 10 minutes.
2. Discard tea bags. Add sugar, stirring until dissolved. Pour into a 1-gal.
container, and add 7 cups cold water. Serve over ice.

NOTE: this makes more like a half-gallon of tea instead of a gallon. Tea photo is from the SL website, photographer is Beth Dreiling Hontzas.

Until next time,
Melissa