Pictured here, you see McDonald’s new “Sweet Tea”, which apparently is meant to add to the Southern Style menu that is fashionable of late. I like tea. I like sugar. Sweet tea, however, mixes the two ingredients in an unholy ratio. While I haven’t scientifically measured, I estimate the sugar-to-tea ratio is about eleventy five bajillion to one. I’ve eaten sugar cubes that are less sweet than this stuff.
The scary part, is that upon asking a friend that lives in the south about this crazy Northern version of the beverage that is so common in the south, he assured me that it’s probably sweeter down there. (This, by the way, would only be possible by creating some tea-based super solution, which would instantly crystallize when ingested. I’m just sayin’)
Soooo…. What the heck?!?!! Y’all from down south: Do you really enjoy this sort of thing? Do you also suck the honey right out of the honey bear too? Has the heat gotten to all y’all?
Oh, and there is a particularly sweet, slightly brown snowbank outside my house.
“Aw, sweety, you’re so cute. Come on, sugar, tell us what y’all really feel. Now, honey-bunch, y’all just relax.”
Where did you think that kind of thing came from?
I like tea with sugar in it. And I’ll bet that it’s got fewer calories than an equal portion of that soda pop. But I prefer to be the one sweetening it.
And, by the way, sweet brown snow? I’ve heard of yellow snow before. Why do Northerners always have to color their snow?
Actually, you’re pretty much right on to how sweet tea is made. You brew the tea, and while it is still hot, dump in the sugar. So you do, in fact, get a super saturated solution.
It’s akin to drinking coke syrup I believe.
I grew up on
this stuff. I’m pretty sure we drank it at every meal but breakfast. And there was always a pitcher in the fridge.
Yep. People down here do like their sweet tea. 😉 We sell it very fast at the takeout. There are people who come in just to buy the tea and nothing else. We also offer “unsweet tea” but it doesn’t sell as fast.
You just wanted to type y’all a bunch of times didn’t you?
And did you catch the plural of “y’all” ?
All Y’all.
🙂
I don’t like sugar in tea of any kind.
I don’t get “Sweet Tea.” Nasty.
I thought the plural of y’all is y’alls.
Guys, we’ve discussed this before. Its all-a-y’all.
No debate will be tolerated.
Y’all’s is a plural possessive.
Did all-a-y’all get y’all’s sweet tea?
Y’all, the word y’all is ALREADY PLURAL. Geez, amateur linguists. 😉
You have failed to mention the kissin’ cousins to sweettea (it runs together like one word). There’s instant tea (Nathan’s Nestea) and there’s fruit-flavored tea. Both are high on my ick scale as well.
Plain basic brewed black tea (or sun-brewed black tea) with lots of ice. A lemon wedge is acceptable but not required. A hint of splenda or sugar is ok for the faint of heart.
I ordered McD’s iced coffee in the ‘plain’ or ‘regular’ variety once last summer. Ewwww… sweet enough to gag me. Apparently ‘plain’ just means unflavored sweetness.
Speaking as one who has lived in both the North and the South, I can honestly say sweat tea is an unholy abomination. Unfortunately, the further one goes South the more likely it is you’ll get sweetened tea if you do not specifically order unsweetened tea. In some heathen lands of the South, there are actually places that don’t even sell unsweetened tea.
Iced tea is ideally made by placing 5 bags of black tea inside a 1 gallon glass (not plastic!) jar and set out in the sunshine until the jar is dark. It should then be taken inside, tea bags removed and refrigerated. It should be served with no more than 3 one inch cubes of ices per 8oz glass. As Jeri mentions, a slice of lemon in a glass of iced tea is acceptable; however no, I repeat NO sweeteners are acceptable.
Hot tea can have a single spoon of honey added to it, if one is sick with a sore throat. Or the faint of heart can add a small amount of milk, but only if they put the milk in the cup before the tea (reversing the order curdles the milk).
Not true. Just poured boiling water over tea bags and while still hot put in milk=no curdles. Lemon in tea would curdle milk but I have NEVER had milk curdle in plain hot tea by adding milk last. NEVER.
Sweet tea is disgustig, and I have been in parts of west Texas where they didn’t have any other kind. 🙁
What? Art thou mad?
It’s simply “all y’all”.
It would only be “all a y’all” if you had someone who was actually trying to pronounce “all of you all”. And that doesn’t happen. At least not around here.
And I do live in the state that is entirely contained within Appalachia.
And anyone who says y’uns gets a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
I only ever heard “y’uns” (pronounced youens) in westeen PA. Yuck.
My aunts in Texas say “all y’all”, so I’m going to have to side with Michelle.
I’m really surprised that Kool-Aid has never made a tea flavored drink.
Well All-a-y’all was the accepted version in North Florida. And Mark has an awful lot of rigid rules. Just sayin’.
It’s “all y’all” outside of the panhandle and some heathen parts of Alabama.
Virginians and Carolinians (both kinds) do not drink tea that sweet. The northern border of Georgia is about the line where tea starts to get disgusting, although the disease is creeping into southern Tennessee.
The Japanese know how to do it right. I am having a tea right now made by Kirin breweries that is only 15 calories per 100 mL, meaing a 20 oz bottle would only be about 89 calories (contrast with something disgusting such as Snapple Tea at 250 calories for 20 oz). The perfect hint of sweetness to counter the bitterness of the lightly fermented red tea. It comes in lemon and milk flavors as well.
@Nathan: The only actual rule is no sweeteners in tea. The rest are more what you’d call “guidelines” than actual rules.
And Michelle – it’s “yinz guyz”, not “Y’uns”.
And Dahntahn. I want to go dahntahn, but the roads are a bit slippy, yinz guyz.
Pittsburghese is what you get when you cross Scotts-irish with Polish.
I figured you’d call me on that John.
Whatever it is, I HATE it.
You people are absolutely insane. There is no greater thing of beauty than a tall glass of sweet tea with lemon. God handed the recipe to Moses along with the holy tablets.
It’s not tea, it’s sugar water with a hint of tea flavoring. Dump it* in the Boston Harbor!
*By it I mean sweet tea, I actually enjoy normal tea, not that sickly sweet abomination those south of the Mason-Dixion line try to pass off as tea.
All I drink is sweet tea and water, mainly sweet tea. And down here there are places that don’t sell unsweeted tea. I do prefer to make my own sweet tea though.