The sweet tea phenomenon

Sweet tea is the house wine of the South
- Steel Magnolias

Southern sweet tea deserves its own separate classification and with it, a cultural description. When many tea enthusiasts consider drinking a glass of sweet tea, they lose their normal insistence on quality loose leaf in favor of sugary, Lipton tea brewed from bags. What? I’ve found myself in this situation many times when at a friend’s house for dinner. Even more shocking is the fact that McDonald’s, of all places, actually serves a really good sweet tea. Therefore, some tea enthusiasts have placed southern sweet tea in a separate category all its own, in order to deal with the contradictions.

Tacoma has its own sweet tea aficionado by the name of Dr. Mike Spivey. He hails from Louisiana and currently teaches at the University of Puget Sound. No, he doesn’t teach on tea or the South, but on Mathematics. But wouldn’t it be cool if Puget Sound had a professor of tea!

Dr. Spivey is a sweet tea aficionado for several reasons. First, he makes a good size batch of sweet tea three times a week. Second, he remembers parts of his life based on different experiences in and around sweet tea. Third, he is very particular about how he makes it. Here are some excerpts of an interview with Dr. Spivey on the subject.

Tacoma Tea Examiner: “How would you describe the culture around sweet tea in the South?”

Dr. Spivey: “You can order it in restaurants and the servers will know exactly what you are talking about. This is true for many houses in the South. At community events or church socials, they often have two pitchers, one labeled 'unsweet tea' and the other, 'sweet tea.'"

Tacoma Tea Examiner: “What memories come to mind when you think about sweet tea?”

Dr. Spivey: “In college, I took a trip to Boston with a friend. We were going to school in Birmingham. He loved sweet tea and tried to order it in a restaurant. The waitress responded, ‘What’s that?’ That was my second time out of the South in 15 years.”

Tacoma Tea Examiner: “What is the trick to making great sweet tea?”

Dr. Spivey: “Sugar placed in cold tea doesn’t dissolve well and the tea doesn’t taste the same. There ends up being a mass of soggy sugar at the bottom of the glass. Basic chemistry tells us that sugar dissolves better in hot liquid. I had a moment in my high school Chemistry class when we were learning about how well something dissolves in liquid. I thought to myself, ‘So, that’s why sweet tea tastes better when sugar is added while it is still hot!’”

Tacoma Tea Examiner (laughing): “How do you make sweet tea?”

The following is Dr. Spivey’s method of making the perfect sweet tea.

Fill a saucepan with about 2 cups of water. Bring it to a boil with the lid on. When it comes to a boil, take it off the burner. Add 4 Lipton tea bags, and let sit for about 5 minutes. Take bags out by wrapping the bag strings around a wooden spoon and the bag in order to squeeze out any remaining tea water. Add ¾ cup sugar or to taste, and stir. Don’t be alarmed, the sugar won’t all dissolve right away. In a glass pitcher, pour a little room temperature water in the bottom, pour in hot tea, run some water in the pan and slosh it around to get out more of the sugar, pour into the pitcher, fill the rest of the pitcher with water until there is about two quarts of tea, and stir well. Put a towel on top of the pitcher and refrigerate. Always make sweet tea ahead so it has time to cool completely.

Now, you have the perfect sweet tea recipe and a glimpse of southern sweet tea culture alive and well in Tacoma, Washington. Happy sweet tea drinking!