Nothing quite screams summer like a nice, cold glass of iced tea. Especially if you use the sun to steep, add fresh fruit to enhance the flavor and up the deliciousness with a few drops of medicated tincture for an extra kick. This recipe is great addition to any Labor Day celebration as we welcome in a new season.
What’s a Tincture?
Tinctures are concentrated liquid extracts, often made using alcohol, to draw out the nutritional and healing properties of herbs and plants. They have a long shelf-life, especially when stored in cool, dark areas. Like edibles, tinctures are consumed orally but have a higher absorption rate when taken sublingually or under the tongue, where it is quickly diffused into the blood through tissues in the mouth. When dosing a tincture sublingually, the effects can begin to set in a soon as 15 minutes after consumption or can take up to about 45 minutes. Most people will feel the effects reach their peak around 90 minutes.
Choose Your Adventure
For this super-simple iced tea recipe, you’ll be utilizing the powerful rays of the summer sun to help the tea steep and naturally deepen its flavor. You can be in full creative control by choosing the type of tea you want as your base as well as deciding between sativa, indica or hybrid strain tinctures to navigate whether you want to feel uplifted with a cerebral high, more relaxed with a body buzz or a pleasant balance of the two.
Because you’ll be using a cannabis-infused tincture, it’s important to make sure that you pay special attention the dosage amount indicated on the label so that you can carefully include the right amount for your preference. If you’re using your own tincture that you have made at home, it’s recommended to start with a 1 mL dose to see how you feel before increasing the amount one mL at a time to reach your preference.
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You can keep the dose low for a nice, steady buzz or double or triple the dose if you’re up for a more noticeable high. It’s up to you what type of experience you want to have with this iced tea. You can go for a high THC/low CBD tincture for a more psychoactive experience or opt for a high CBD/low THC tincture if you’re interested in a more chill, subtle experience.
Tinctures can be swallowed regularly in foods or drinks but keep in mind that it will be absorbed at a much slower by your liver than the other method, similar to how an edible sets in, so be patient while you sip on your refreshing drink and let the good times roll.
Ingredients for Infused Sun Tea
- 1 gallon of water
- 8 tea bags (I recommend straight up traditional Lipton tea)
- 1 cup of water
- 1 cup diced peaches
- Cannabis-infused tincture (dosage depends on desired strength)
- Honey or agave (optional, to taste)
- Mint for garnish
Equipment
- A glass gallon jar or pitcher
- Ice cube tray
- Blender or food processor (optional)
How-To
Place all 8 tea bags into the glass gallon jar or pitcher and fill it up with room temperature water. Find a bright, sunny spot where your container can rest in the sun for 3 to 4 hours undisturbed. As the tea steeps, the color of the liquid will darken, letting you know that the flavors are deepening. Depending on the heat and sun exposure, you might need to leave it out in the sun a little longer.
When the tea is finished, remove the tea bags and discard. If you’d like, you can add honey or agave to mildly sweeten it, but remember that the natural flavor of the infused peach ice cubes will also add a little bit of its own sweetness and flavor.
If you have a blender or food processor, you can make a peach puree by combining 1 cup of water and 1 cup of diced peaches in the appliance and blending to your preferred consistency before pouring into an ice tray. Alternatively, you can evenly distribute the diced peaches in each compartment.
Add your desired dosage amount of tincture to each piece of ice in the ice tray before putting in the freezer. Remember that if you have 5 ice cubes per drink that your dosage will be times five.
When the tea is finished, pour into glasses, add ice cubes and enjoy!
