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June Sipdown Challenge Prompt – drink a flash chilled tea

I have been saving recipes for special beverages on Pinterest for a while now, and one of the most recent is something they are calling Good Girl Moonshine, or GGMS for short. Supposedly the ginger and vinegar are giving you “cleansing benefits” and the beverage is recommended for people who are trying to give up sodas.

The truth is that the recipes are simply variations of switchel, such as Ma made in Laura Ingalls Wilder’s book, The Long Winter.

Switchel was cold well water with ginger, sweetener, and vinegar. It was refreshing, and because of the ginger a hot farm worker could glug as much as they wanted without getting a stomachache. I expect it could also be made as a hot beverage in cold weather for a tummy soother or for sore throats.

The new recipes are mostly for concentrated tea, sweetener, apple cider vinegar at a rate of one tablespoon per glass, and ginger. I have seen some with grated ginger boiled in simple syrup and some that call for ground ginger. Most of the new recipes start with a fruit based infusion or a plain hibiscus. You can add cold water to dilute the syrup or sparkling water.

My method today was – the last three teabags of this tea – which were so full of ground ginger that it poofed out of the bags when I put it in the infuser, so no additional ginger needed this time – steeped in seven ounces water. This infusion was poured over ice in a shaker and shaken until cold. Then I poured it into a carafe and added two tablespoons of vinegar. By the recipe it should have been more like three but this is a first try. I poured this over ice, added simple syrup, and diluted with sparkling water.

If you make it ahead of time instead instead of at the last minute as I did, you can skip the shaker step and just refrigerate it until ready to serve.

I liked it very much, and Ashman did, too.

Thank you, again, Martin!