Fermenting Tea Idea's

I recently thought about looking for hard tea recipes. I love to brew beer but I do not have a lot of time as of late, or money. I haven't done and research on hard tea yet, but I ALWAYS make iced tea in the summer.

My recipe goes:

12 Lipton Tea bags
1/4 cup Agave nectar
2 quarts water.

Procedure:

1. Melt the agave in a little bit of hot water.
2. Pour cold filtered water over tea bags till full to 2 qaurts.
3. Let steep and chill overnight with added lemon of lime.

My thought was to just add more agave to bring the brix up, then add yeast the following day. I have an abundance of agave from where I work, and thats why I use it.

Sometimes I throw in different flavoring tea bags, like Lemon rosehip or blueberry.

Thoughts?

Sean From NH

That sounds good to me. I would be interested in doing something like that as well. I am pretty new to brewing so I am looking for little projects to entertain me and have good yield while my equipment is tied up. Would you backsweeten yours?

How will the acidity of the tea affect the yeasties?

It will be fine. I brew kombucha tea which is a strong tea fermented with a SCOBY made of bacteria and yeast (Symbiotic Culture OF Bacteria and Yeast, or mushroom). Plenty of activity and enough to carbonate the bottles later.

Although this has nothing to do with fermenting tea, your iced tea with agave sounds great. I'll brew up a gallon this weekend I won't even need a carboy. Sometimes I forget how easy drinks can be to make when you don't have to spend a whole day making them and then fermenting for 2 months.

It's delicious. Agave is a lot sweeter by volume than sugar, so that's why I use so little in a 2 quart batch. Though the nice thing about agave is that it will mix completely into cold water, so you can just sweeten it by the glass with a vigorous swirl.

It is also less refined and has a lower glycemic index.

I'll probably make up a batch of tea to ferment tomorrow!

Sean From NH

so this ended up good, may i ask did you take gravity readings and what was your final abv? Did it taste anything like commercial teas like twisted tea? or way better being home-made?

oh this is juts normal tea, duh (slap myself)

Hah, yeah I haven't done it YET. I plan on whipping some up today while at work. I only have US-04/05 and Cotes de Blanc on hand, so I'm not sure what I'll put in there. I'd prefer not to back sweeten and I'm not looking for anything really high in alcohol, so I may just load it up with enough fermentable to make it finish around 1.020 or something.

I'll post my updates here.

Sean From NH

one of my friends only drinks twisted teas, will not drink beer, so i would like to make a one gallon batch of tea for him. So tell us how it works out and drum up a recipe

Ok, just whipped up a batch. Here is what I did.

Half gallon batch (decided to do a small test and not waste ingredients)

12 tea bags
8 ounces (by weight) agave syrup.

Mixed agave and hot tap water, then added tea bags. Let steep for a while. Took brix reading (10 brix at 80 degrees.) about 1.040. Pitched into growler with packet of US-05.

We'll see how it comes out. Tasted great, but I just realized I used double the tea bags I normally do.

Oh well.

Sean From NH

I noticed you use agave because you have it in hand at work, but can it be picked up at a super market? i dont really know what it is, and could you also just substitute with sugar?

Sure you can. Agave is nectar from the agava plant. Agave plant is used to make tequila. It's a sweet syrup much like honey. It's expensive. You can always you sugar. I would suggest a raw cane sugar of some kind.

The thing to worry about when it comes to refined sugar like table sugar is, it doesn't dissolve unless heated. I usually cold brew my ice tea, but if you're going to brew it hot and then cool it you can use any sugar you want.

Sean From NH

have you heard of stevia? i have a plant of that im going to throw in the garden, its a leaf, a herb, a natural sweetener, but i dont think it would ever bring up the og on anything unless you had tons, and ground it up.

I suggest you put some DME in there it will give the tea a little body. I use about 3#'s per 5 gallon batch of hard tea.

As for the agave... I discovered putting a cup of it in my secondary when I top up gives my "Cervesa's" a distinctly Mexican flavor.

So any luck? How'd it come out?