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Sippin’ on Summer: Tazo’s Iced Green, Black and Passion Tea (with Giveaway!)

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There are a lot of things I love about summer, but iced tea is definitely one of them. Credit: TheCulinaryGeek

Here’s my definition of summer: flip flops, cut-offs, bikini top, chemical-free sunscreen and a glass of iced tea. To me, this is summery perfection. But, I’ll be honest, making a big vat of iced tea can be tasty—for the first five glasses or so—and then you kind of need something to spice things up. Something like passion…

We recently were sent some of Tazo’s new Iced Tea Filterbags, which make brewing iced tea at home easy and tasty. Leading the pack for me in the taste department was the Passion iced tea, which is a caffeine-free blend of hibiscus flowers, herbs and tropical flavors. Without being overwhelmingly strong, it’s fruity, fun and a really pretty bright pink-red color that just feels festive. Like you’re on vacay, which is always a good way to feel. The black and green tea varieties are good, too, but they’re nothing extraordinary in my opinion—good quality that you expect from Tazo (which is made by Starbucks, by the way), but nothing to write home about.

teaEach big filterbag brews two quarts of iced tea, and each package contains six bags. You simply boil a liter of water, put it in your pitcher with your ginormous Tazo tea bag (they are big), let it seep for three minutes, and then add another liter of cold water and ice. Cool it on down and then enjoy. But a rather serious word of caution: If you’re using a glass pitcher, do not—I repeat DO NOT—poor boiling water directly into it. It seems common sense, but I had quite the “incident” at home when I did so and it busted my glass pitcher with Passion tea in it all over my kitchen, totally freaking my dog out. (Hey, I was a journalism major, not a scientist. Although I should have known better since I have to watch this when brewing kombucha at home.) So I recommend brewing your tea bag in the pot you boiled in, and then adding ice and cold water to that pot before pouring into a pitcher (plastic or glass). Again, boiling water should not go directly into a pitcher. Trust me on this. The mess is, well, messy and tricky to clean up with the shards of glass and all.

Want to try some of this iced tea yourself? Just promise us in the comments that you won’t be a doofus and pour boiling water in a glass pitcher, and we’ll select one lucky U.S. reader to win a sample of Tazo’s Iced Tea Filterbags, a glass pitcher, super-cute glasses and a stirrer for your summer tea-drinking enjoyment. Cheers!—Jenn


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