Peach Bourbon Iced Tea

Foodies,

It’s a humid sweltering day in TO today, a perfect opportunity to make something I’ve always wanted to try – bourbon iced tea. Not just any bourbon iced tea mind you, though – this one is made with my own peach-infused bourbon blend back from my infusion thread on the Beer and Spirits forum.

To refresh everyone’s memory, I blended equal parts of Maker’s Mark 46, W.L. Weller 12 Year old and Elijah Craig 12 Year Old bourbon and then let it sit with one cup of dried peaches to infuse it with concentrated peach flavor.

It was only a matter of time before I tried this out. So here’s the deelio:

• 6 black tea bags (I went with black because I think the flavor of bourbon is too strong for green or white tea)
• 6 cups water
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/4 tsp pure peppermint extract
• 1 cup peach infused bourbon
• 1 large lemon, juiced

Make the tea in a standard coffeemaker by removing the coffee filter and throwing in the tea bags in the drip pot. Use only 6 cups because you need space in the pitcher for the bourbon, sugar, extract and lemon juice additions. Alternatively, infuse in a large pitcher or jar. While still hot, pour in the cup of sugar and stir until dissolved.

Cool the tea down to room temperature. Add in the bourbon, lemon juice and peppermint extract. Stir until well blended. Fill a glass with ice and pour the iced tea over. Enjoy.

Boy this was good. I can see why Southerners love it. The bourbon adds quite a rich but complementary caramel flavor to the tea which is then highlighted by the lemon, peach and mint flavors. FYI, the ABV content of the final product is quite low as you are taking a cup of 40% ABV bourbon and dividing it up by 6 cups of water and 1 cup sugar for a 1:7 which cuts the 40% ABV down to 5% or equal to that of a standard beer.

I’m gonna try this next with all of my infused spirits including cherry bourbon, pineapple, peach and apricot cognac and homemade limoncello and see how it turns out.

Explain or define dried peaches. This drink is intriguing.

@Mark: The peaches were quite literally dried peach slices that you would get from the dried fruit section of a supermarket, same place where you’d find the dried apricots, raisins and cranberries. I took a cup of these, sliced them up, and let them infuse in the bourbon for two full weeks. This is a sipping spirit for me normally but I thought I’d use it to make iced tea today.

Tran;

If I read your B&S post from a year ago correct, the dried peaches should stay in the Bourbon for 4-7 days?

Yes, preferably 7 and as long as two weeks.

Tran, I’m sipping it now. It is really good. The only deviation from your recipe is that I used mint from my herb garden rather than the extract. On a humorous note, my wife poured herself a glass thinking it was normal ice tea. I enjoyed the look on her face when she discovered it wasn’t .

Very cool to know that I have a satisfied online customer. Thanks. FYI I have tweakd my own recipe and increased the water to 8 cups while keeping everything else the same for the exact reason you got a big smile from your wife’s reaction – it might be too strong for other people’s tastes. By my calculations, the 6 cup water version has an ABV equivalent to wine and the 8 cup version equivalent to beer which might be more palatable for some people. I think I even prefer it myself.

Oh, and nice touch with the fresh garden grown mint!