I love watermelon, I mean, who doesn't, but i don't often buy them for myself for one main reason. They are so freaking big and once you cut open a melon, the rest of what is not eaten needs to be refrigerated which would be fine but I have a very tiny fridge and sticking a watermelon in there takes up about half the space. And sure, I could maybe eat a whole melon all to may face in one sitting, but then I would explode. And yes, I know you can buy smaller wedges of melon at the store, but I refuse. Those wedges just seem gross and expensive and wrong to me. When I buy watermelon I take my chances and buy the whole thing and just eat the crap out of it until I make room for other food in the fridge.
It has been so hot out (too hot) and I really just needed a watermelon, so I bought a watermelon (the biggest one I could find because of course). I waited for a day until the fridge was near empty and cut the beast up. Half went into the fridge right away (I had just eaten the last of the greens to make room) and the other half, well only a 1/4 was eaten. I could have kept going and eaten the rest or I figured I would just make a nice tea drink with the rest. And that what I did and that's this drink I show you here. Smooth, bright, and earthy iced green tea with fresh sweet watermelon, it's all summertime up in you mouth. And pureeing up watermelon into a liquid definitely takes up way less space in the fridge. I am a genius.
The stuff. Some watermelon, a few green tea bags, a lime( or a lemon), a spring or two of mint, and some water.
Start off with making the tea. Hot water to tea bags, steep for 5 or so minutes then remove bags. Stick tea in fridge to cool.
Now for the watermelon. Remove the rind from the fruit , and cut it up into chunks. Toss in a few mint leaves and.....
Pureeit.
So you have cooled tea, pureed watermelon and the juice of a lime.
Pour it all together and mix it all up.
And there you have it. Fresh watermelon green ice tea, ready for your drinking.
All you need now are glasses full of ice and little wedges of melon.
All the summertime, all the watermelon.
Hope you are all staying cool.
-C
Watermelon Iced Green Tea
make 6 1/2 cups
- 4 green tea bags
- 4 cups water
- 1/4 of a watermelon (about 2 1/2 cups liquid watermelon)
- 1 lime (lemon works too)
- a few sprigs of mint (optional)
Bring water to an almost boil (I let my tea pot whistle, turn it off and sit for a minute or two) and pour hot water over tea bags. Let steep for about 5 minutes, then remove bags and refrigerate tea until cold.
When the tea has cooled, take you melon, remove the rind, and puree the fruit along with the mint, with a blending device of you choice. Squeeze in the juice of the lime and give it all a good stir.
Pour tea over ice, garnish with a sprig of mint and a slice of watermelon if you want some fancy.