Nostalgia on ice: Cold, sugary tea is a sweet Southern tradition

wilmington star ^ | 13 June 2007 | Lisa Singhania

[Resolute Conservative]

Well the guys wanted a Whataburger ( my staple food ) but I talked them into going for a real lunch. I had Chicken and Dumplins ( big fat dry in the middle dumplins ), green beans, steamed carrots, and rolls with about half a gallon of sweet tea...

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Yup. When ever I’m in Memphis, I head to Corky’s for the ribs.

[cbkaty]

Hot tea?

Surely all Gentlemen south of the Mason Dixon line will understand the penalties associated with such heresy...

Tea is served iced....in a sweatin glass, on the porch, while the kids are sit around the pecan tree stabbin a 10 pound slab of ice with a fine point ice pick (kids like ta play) to pack around the ice cream churn.

Then we get to watch em argue over who gonna turn the churn.... Kids...God luvem...

[luckystarmom]

I live in California now, and In-n-Out Burgers makes the best iced tea. The good thing about California is that they usually serve tea with fresh lemons. I love fresh lemons in my tea (and I squeeze the juice out). I can’t stand the fake stuff.

[Wallace T.]

The cuts of steak used for chicken fried steak are usually the less expensive, less desirable ones, such as chuck steak, round steak, and occasionally flank steak, cuts of meat usually relegated to hamburger or stew meat. The better cuts are seldom used for this dish. It probably originated in Texas, where German immigrants applied their weiner schnitzel recipes to the tougher cuts of steak. It spread from Texas into the South and Midwest, and is sometimes called country fried steak in those regions.

[Ol' Sox]

Loved your post. I came to enjoy sweet tea, even though I am a Connecticut Yankee. My Tennessee grandmother, transplanted to Cape Cod, brought it with her. My childhood summers at her house included bacon and butter sandwiches and a glass of that sweet tea at the crack of dawn;
- striding knee deep, gathering Pleasant Bay quahogs in seawater so cold it made your feet cramp up;
- evenings on her screened porch 50 yards from the beach;
- mornings where the fog was so thick, the only sensory input was the smell of beach roses;
- spearfishing enough flounder in a half hour to feed the whole family;
- Friday night band concerts at the town green, kids running through the summer night while parents sat on blankets forming a "home base";
- Art Gould's boats for rent - the crustiest old yankee SOB you ever came across, until you learned of his WWII exploits as skipper of a destroyer and gained some respect;
- rediscovering my fishing rod complete with last year's dried out sandworm still on the hook, sitting in the garden shed that was 120 degrees hot and smelled so strongly of rose dust that you thought you might be fumigated;
- the smell of the giant honeysuckle on the back fence;
- the light from Chatham lighthouse up the street racing across the outer bar and blinking in the upstairs bedroom.

I realize that much of my adult ambition stems from trying to recreate that time and place. My backyard smells of beach roses and honeysuckle, and occasionally, when my good wife allows, we all indulge in bacon and butter sandwiches (now named "Thelmas" in honor of my wonderful grandmother).

[MissouriConservative]

bump for later drooling.

[luckystarmom]

I think I’ve never had a weight problem because I drink unsweetened tea instead of Coke (or sodas).

[Juana la Loca]

don’t forget the fried okra, sweet potato cassrole, cheese grits, biscuits, and fried catfish.....YUM!

[beckysueb]

I don’t know but the other day something reminded me of childhood and the memory was so strong I could smell the sweet hay fresh from cutting. I mean, I could literally smell hay. It was wonderful!

[JoeSixPack1]

N. Georgia Sweet Tea

3 Luzianne large ice tea brew tea bags
1 cup sugar
1 gallon water

Remove tea from bags and place in 12 cup coffee maker and brew 12 cups. (Use paper filter)
In small cup mix sugar and at least 1 cup of Hot tea, stir till dissolved.
Pour tea, sugar mix & water into 1 gallon jug and refrigerate.

Take yesterdays sweet tea from refrigerator, pour into 24 ounce tumbler, add 6 cubes of ice, get cigar, get 22 long rifle.
Sit on back deck, load 22, sip tea, light cigar, wait for varmints.

[luckystarmom]

I was just asking my daughters if I had ever made them cheese grit. I haven’t. They’ve never had fried okra either.

Yesterday, they had chicken fried steak for the first time.

I’m in California, and I am definitely doing a poor job of passing on Texas favorite foods.

[RockinRight]

Unsweetened tea. Blech.

Sweet tea - yum.

[RockinRight]

Remind me not to come by for dinner then! ;-)

[RockinRight]

To each their own, but I don’t get it. Tea with no sugar is bitter and not tasty. If I don’t want sweet I just order water!

[uglybiker]

Time for lunch.

In the South, that would be dinner.

Breakfast, dinner and supper.

[Constitutions Grandchild]

What wonderful memories. What a wonderful place to “visit” from time to time. There’s a little “Tennessee” in all of us and a little “Connecticut,” too. The last vacation I took was to Williamsburg and then to Norfolk just so I could smell the sea again.

Couldn’t wait to order seafood that wasn’t frozen and shipped across the country. I remember riding bikes around Cape Cod on vacation with my folks. What a wonderful summer!!! I can still taste the “clams” I tried for the first time at the hands of the most handsome young man (I was seventeen). He told me to just close my eyes (yeah, at 17 I still was innocent to believe it) and I could get past the looks of the things. ;-) I order them whenever I can.

Thank you so much for sharing.

[beckysueb]

I'm back living in the North, although my family lives in the South. Whenever I'm down for a visit and they ask me if I want a soda

I am a southerner and its always been called a cold drink. I have only heard northerners call it a soda. Its always a cold drink or a coke. No matter what brand, its always called a coke.

[RockinRight]

Agreed that HFCS is not only bad for you, and doesn’t taste as good as sugar.

I prefer sweet tea with real sugar.

However, in restaurants that only sell unsweetened tea, I use Splenda, because it’s damn near impossible to dissolve sugar in ice cold tea.

I think the reason some places sell it presweetened is partially due to that - it’s difficult to get the sugar to dissolve once it’s cold.

[Abigail Adams]

I have a friend here (midwest) who married a guy from NC. At their rehearsal dinner, they had these plastic jugs with some dark brown liquid in them. The jugs were marked “sweetened” and “unsweetened”. We had no idea what the stuff was. Needless to say they had a lot of it left over.