Lemon Zest & Ginger Tea - టీ (నిమ్మకాయ & అల్లం) - Andhra Recipes Telugu Vantalu - గాయత్రి వంటిల్లు

Method:

Here I have used an electric tea kettle to heat water for making tea. Pour water (175ml) in the kettle and plug it on. While water is heating, take zest of one lemon using a zester---if zester is not there use small holed grater to take zest. Also grate ginger using the zester or small holed grater. Take a small glass bowl and add tea leaves, grated ginger and lemon zest. Pour hot water from the kettle into the bowl over the ingredients. Cover the bowl and let the juices infuse in hot water for 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, squeeze half a lemon into the tea bowl. Now again pour water (500ml) in the kettle and heat it. Place a tea strainer in a bowl and strain the infused tea. Take two 300ml cups and equally pour the strained tea. Add hot water over the tea in the cups and serve.

Points To Observe:

Lemons have natural lemon oils in the zest which is very flavorful. Whenever squeezing lemon juice, first take the zest and then cut the lemon and then squeeze juice. This lemon zest can be used to make cookies, cakes, teas etc. whenever I make lemon pickle I cut few lemons and add juice of few lemons. Before extracting juice I remove the zest using zester and store in airtight container in freezer. I use this frozen zest to make such flavorful teas.

To remove zest use a zester for better results---when zester is used zest would not be bitter. The bigger the size of the hole of grater the bitter the rind would be. Zester has tiny and sharp holes and is easy to remove just zest (the yellow portion of the lemon) of lime or lemon without deeply grating the white portion under the zest.

If zester is not available, use the smallest holed grater in box grater and remove zest of lemons.

The quantities of lemon zest, ginger are just given as a measure to have an idea---a little bit more or less also would do the job.

At times there would be less juice in lemons and at times there would be more juice---add lemon juice according to taste.

I generally take tea this way but if one would like to sweeten it, add some honey to the prepared tea. Now-a-days store bought honey looks like thick sugar syrup and it is difficult to find pure honey in cities---so I don’t add honey to my tea. However always remember to add honey after pouring tea into tea cup. Honey has many beneficial enzymes which are lost when added to hot water above 65 degrees centigrade (Ayurveda says that honey added to sizzling water is poison). By the time tea is poured into tea cup it's heat generally comes down from 100 degrees to 65-70 degrees centigrade (the temperature at which human tongue doesn't burn).

To make one 300ml cup of tea, I use 1/4tsp of black tea leaves or 1/2tsp of green tea leaves. Daily morning we take that much black or green tea with a squeeze of half a lemon for two cups.

I generally use different combinations to make different flavored teas and in the coming posts you would learn them.

I prefer to infuse tea in small quantity of water first. Even if this water cools by the time we actually want to have tea---no problem. I add this warm or cold infused tea in my cup and top it up with hot water so that the drink is perfect to have a sip. If we infuse the tea in the entire quantity of water we need to drink it immediately. I do not prefer to reheat the tea after adding lemon juice. As all family members may not assemble at the time the tea is ready, this method works to have hot tea even later.

Tea kettle is a handy appliance to heat water. Pour water into the kettle and then switch on---it automatically gets switched off once water reaches the boiling point---so no need to pay any attention while water is boiling in kettle.

The mild flavor of lemon zest in the infused tea is difficult to identify unless one is too familiar with it. It has a pleasant and refreshing smell. Ginger is good for health especially in rainy and winter seasons to fight with cold and flu. The combination of lemon zest and ginger takes the bland black tea to the next level.

It may look weird but believe and try for one self and add a pinch of salt per cup of tea to enhance the taste.

Do try the tasty lemon zest ginger black tea and enjoy the flavor and get benefits of good health.

Enjoy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

103 Recipes you may also like to watch