Blackberry Sun Tea

By Kelly Bogard

You know something that most Texans love? Iced tea. And do you know why we love iced tea? Because in the summer, it gets stinkin’ hot here. As the mercury continues to rise this summer, we have to have a good way cool off. Over the last few weeks, it has been anywhere from 95-105 degrees in Central Texas. Sure, we can try to stay cool by staying inside in the air conditioning, but then we can’t enjoy the sunshine or a nice breeze.

Being a mom of a young child, we spend a ton of time outside. Butters is always finding a new way to cool herself off while playing in the backyard. Running through the sprinklers and playing in a kiddie pool with the dogs are some of her favorites. But her daddy and I don’t always want to get wet, so we do the next best thing. We make sure we have iced tea in hand.

For Blackberry Sun Tea, you will need…
12 oz. fresh blackberries, rinsed
1 c. sugar
1 c. water
4 family-sized tea bags
4 quarts of water for tea

Texas is the perfect place to make sun tea, because, let’s face it, we have a lot of sun here. Man is it hot today! Excuse me while I have a sip of my tea.

I love mixing flavors together, and blackberries and tea are no exception. In fact, now that I have the blackberry tea in my box of goodies (recipe box), I think I will try some other flavors like strawberry, peach, maybe even a lavender or mint tea. I’ll get back with you on how they turn out.

First, place the blackberries, sugar and one cup of water in a small pot. Stir well to make sure that you have the berries coated in the sugary water.

Bring to a boil and let everything simmer until the blackberries start to break down. Isn’t it neat that the blackberries turn red when they cook?

Remove the blackberries from the heat and strain the juice into a small measuring cup. Then, add the juice only into the tea pitcher with the water and tea bags. Now, put the pitcher outside and let the sun do its work for the next four hours or so.

This recipe makes quite a bit of tea, but you can reduce the recipe to half for a smaller amount. We use the larger amount because we go through it so quickly.

I hope you are finding ways to beat the summer heat. From all of us at Texas Table Top, enjoy!

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