Green Tea Granita

As it turns out last Wednesday, June 6, was National Iced Tea Day!  Who knew?  Well, the folks at Lipton did and they sent me a message only I didn't read it until today.  So my timing is only a little off, but YAY...TEA!

Wanted to do something different from just a beverage and found a lot of recipes for tea-smoked meats which I might try and bring you sometime later down the road, but with hot summer weather creeping up on us, I thought a cool treat would be more appropriate.

I've never tried to make granita before so this was fun.  It does take some planning ahead because you need several hours to get the proper freeze on, but it's worth the time.  If you're not familiar with it, granita is pretty much Sno-Cone for adults (and you can thank the Sicilians for coming up with this little treat).

Granitas have the same basic ingredients -- sugar, water, and flavoring -- and is in the same family as sorbet or Italian ice only the final product is much coarser and more crystallized.  In lieu of plain water, I chose green tea and added honey for flavoring.  Cool and refreshing, and in this case, the ultimate Iced Tea!

Green Tea Granita

2 cups brewed green tea, room temperature
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp honey

Mix the sugar and honey into the green tea until both are dissolved.  Pour mixture into a metal 9x13 baking dish and set in freezer.

Every 30-45 minutes, open the freezer and scrape the mixture around with plastic forks to break it up Plastic forks so that you don't have metal scraping on metal.

Continue doing so until granita is completely frozen and grainy.

Serve it up with a garnish of fresh mint.

NOTES

I used a blend from Southern Seasons called Green Dragon which was a mix of green tea, lemon peel, marigold petals, golden chrysanthemums, passions fruit and lemon flavors.  Smells divine and tastes even better!  Feel free to experiment with your favorite blend of tea.

I had Mr. Coffee help me with my tea.  Put my loose tea leaves in a filter and ran it through twice to get a stronger brew.  It was faster than steeping it.

You can freeze your granita using a tempered glass baking dish, just be aware that it will take longer and make allowances for the additional time.

If you didn't want to do tea, you could use coffee, or your favorite fruit juice.  You can add flavored liqueurs to give it more of an adult taste. Just be aware that most alcohol doesn't freeze so you want to use very little or just realize that your granita will be semi-frozen versus frozen.