How can I make Starbucks shaken ice tea lemonade at home?

November 3, 2007 6:51 PM

I love Starbucks shaken ice tea lemonade with passion fruit tea. How can I attempt to replicate this at home?

I've googled around to no avail. I have passion fruit tea and I have lemonade. Either I have the wrong brands or I'm missing an ingredient, because it just doesn't taste the same. Am I missing something? Is this even possible?

posted by heavenstobetsy to food & drink (11 answers total)

Get temporary job at starbucks to find out!
posted by outsider at 7:12 PM on November 3, 2007

What kind of lemonade are you using? Using something like Simply Lemonade will probably taste more like the starbucks drink than corn syrup+citric acid+artificial flavors concoction. For the tea, I'm guessing Starbucks uses Tazo tea, I don't know if it is some sort of premade iced tea or brewed from the bag. If you've tried Tazo passion fruit tea at home and it doesn't taste right, try China Mist passion tea. Whenever I've had the passion fruit iced tea lemonade, I always wished they used china mist because whatever they use has such a bitter aftertaste.
posted by necessitas at 7:18 PM on November 3, 2007

Here's the recipe, from someone who works at Starbucks. She mentions simple syrup, which is boiled water and sugar, just in case you didn't know. It really does make a difference in sweet drinks.
posted by iconomy at 7:22 PM on November 3, 2007

FYI: The Tea-Lemonade combination is often called an "Arnold Palmer."
posted by Frank Grimes at 7:35 PM on November 3, 2007

I'm guessing Starbucks uses Tazo tea, I don't know if it is some sort of premade iced tea or brewed from the bag.

Yes, it's oversized Tazo tea bags which we just brewed from the coffee pot's hot water spigot. Once brewed from the tea bags, it sat in the fridge until the pitcher was empty and we brewed a new pitcher. I hate tea so never drank it, but was told it's the syrup which added that extra yumminess. Though I forget the brand, the lemonade we used was definitely not high on the citric acid meter
posted by jmd82 at 7:38 PM on November 3, 2007

How do you get Starbuck/Tazo iced tea flavored tea without paying Starbucks inflated prices? Supermarket tea is very astringent.
posted by Chuckles at 8:08 PM on November 3, 2007

I think these are the bags they use. About $1.50 a bag, but I presume they are the oversized ones that jmd82 is talking about, since they brew a gallon of iced tea.
posted by smackfu at 8:43 PM on November 3, 2007

since you seem to have a suitable answer, i came up with my own twist on the fruity blacktea/lemonade drink... give it a whirl next time you're @ a bucks and are feeling like switching things up a bit.

Venti iced black tea lemonade with 3 pumps of juicy raspberry syrup and 2 pumps of classic.
posted by hummercash at 10:11 PM on November 3, 2007

I'll follow hummercash by suggesting adding almond syrup to passion iced tea.

It tastes TROPICAL. Believe it.
posted by wolfsleepy at 12:28 AM on November 4, 2007

Thanks for all the suggestions, guys! I'm definitely going to try these!
posted by heavenstobetsy at 1:05 AM on November 4, 2007

I have it on good authority that the lemonade Starbucks uses was patterned after Odwalla lemonade, if you want to get it as close as possible.
posted by misskaz at 8:57 AM on November 4, 2007