Pink Saturday - Sun Tea

Pink Saturday - Beverly at the blog "How Sweet the Sound" hosts Pink Saturday. Let the color pink inspire you!


One of my favorite things to drink on a hot summer day is iced tea. My family was from the South, so we grew up drinking iced tea sweetened with sugar, and flavored with a sprig of mint.

Nowadays you can buy bottled teas to drink cold, but when I was young, you had to make it yourself. The best and easiest way is to use the rays of the summer sun to steep it. Just put water and teabags - or even loose tea in an infuser ball - into a clear pitcher or jar of water, and put it in the sun.

Here our upper deck off the kitchen has a southwest exposure, taking full sun most of the day. Just steep it for a few hours and it's done.

There's more to tea than Lipton - the other day I found in my cupboard some hibiscus teabags.


I think I bought this tea in a Persian grocery on Westwood Boulevard here in Los Angeles. Hibiscus tea is made from the dried calyces of the hibiscus flower. In Latin America it's called flor de Jamaica, and is often used to make agua fresca, or sweetened, flavored water. In Egypt and the Middle East it's called Karkade. It is said that hibiscus tea was enjoyed by the pharoahs!

Well, the pharoahs would probably enjoy a cool glass on a hot summer day in Los Angeles. Hibiscus tea has a tart, astringent flavor. It contains anthocyanins, which is supposed to help relieve high blood pressure.


Pink tea for Pink Saturday! Enjoy a glass!