Who is brave enough to fancy a Long Island Iced Tea?

The Long Island Iced Tea has very little to do with tea (other than a vague resemblance in colour) and isn’t a cocktail for the fainthearted or the meek! With a 22% higher alcohol concentration than most highball drinks, the Long Island Iced Tea can easily turn a fun night out into feeling like a castaway the next morning!

Robert Butt, while working at the Oak Beach Inn on Long Island, claims to have invented the Long Island Iced Tea as an entry in a contest to create a new mixed drink with Triple Sec in 1972.

A slightly different drink is claimed to have been invented in the 1920s during Prohibition in the United States by an “Old Man Bishop” in a local community named Long Island in Kingsport, Tennessee.

The potent secret lies in the fact that it comprises five different spirits with very little mixer. A typical Long Island Iced Tea is made with vodka, tequila, light rum, Triple Sec (an orange-flavoured liqueur), gin, and a splash of cola (hence the amber hue resembling iced tea).

One of the more known versions of the cocktail mixes equal parts vodka, tequila, gin, rum, Triple Sec, with 1 plus 0.5 parts sour mix, and a splash of cola. The cocktail is then decorated with a lemon and straw.

How to make a Long Island Iced Tea

This is how you make a Long Island Iced Tea. You will need the following fresh ingredients:

• 1 tot (25ml) lemon juice
• 1 tot simple syrup
• 1 tot Triple Sec orange liqueur
• 1 tot 1st Principles Vodka
• 1 tot white rum
• 1 tot silver tequila
• 1 tot 1st Principles Gin
• 30ml cola
• 1 cup of ice
• Garnish: lemon slice

Follow this easy cocktail recipe to make your own Long Island Iced Tea at home.