Iced tea without any tea
We all love our iced tea
How difficult can it be to make a cup of tea? Lets talk about what happened to me today. I went to this restaurant in Sector 35-C called ‘Nik Bakers’ a sort of a bakery which is good at its best and average on most days. This was to be one of the those days when it was at its worst apparently. I asked for a Peach Iced Tea without any sugar. The guy who billed the beverage was told repeatedly that I want an iced tea without any sugar and he kept nodding his head, mumbling incoherently and finally said “one iced tea without any extra sugar”. That should probably have been my first clue but I admit I was sleepy at that point having just risen some 45 minutes before the event and gone to this ‘bakery’ for my breakfast.
So my order arrived and I took one sip of the drink and I was shocked, it was pure syrup. I mean you could have dunked your mothers home made Gulab Jamuns in it and sweetened them that way! I took the drink to the man at the cashier’s counter and he kept repeating that he had said no extra sugar! I mean the drink was already syrup, does it need any more sugar? So this woman who was also behind the counter then jumps in to the conversation and I asked her about my drink and she said “We do not add any sugar to this drink, the sugar is already included the mix”. Now having paid around 1$ for a drink in a third world country I expect some amount of quality. 1$ is a lot of money in India even with 13% inflation. I asked her “So your iced tea has no tea in it?”. She mumbles something again about a mix and I just leave the counter in disgust.
Coming back to my original question, how hard is it to make Tea. Nik if you are reading this, all you need is a peach flavoured tea bag, water, some ice and no sugar. I will gladly pay you the price you charge for you pre-mix tea if you would please give me some real tea! Oh and at the odd chance if you are reading it, at least serve your customers some decent hot tea and not a Taj Mahal Tea Bag in a cup. Darjeeling or even some good quality non cheap Assam would do nicely. Your hot tea is not priced cheap either so you could probably give us a decent tea bag eh?
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By the way, is the title something inspired by one of my entries? :p
Well, I do NOT mean that he plagiarized my post, if you don’t know that.
No the title is in no way inspired by any of your titles. Its just how the Iced Tea was without any Tea! Thanks for the clarification though!
It’s horrible the way they add so much sugar to everything, mostly catering to the average taste. I cannot drink cold coffee at ccd either, as it comes pre-mixed with sugar. who wants to have dessert instead of coffee!
Nita its easy to find hot drinks in India without any sugar but very difficult to find cold drinks which are unsweetened. If you see my post about Vending Machines you will understand what I mean. I guess with perhaps the world’s largest population of diabetics I think it should be easier to find unsugared (not artificially sweetened) drinks but its not.
My god, what were you thinking! All the times we went out together in search of decent cafes around Chandigarh, have you not learned anything?!
Bakes & Beans is the only place I know of which serves actual Iced TEA.
Have they shut down yet BTW? That’s what usually happens to any decent restaurant or cafe anyway.. either they stop selling all the good stuff, or they shut down.
No hedonist Bakes and Beans have not shut down, they are alive and kicking and they do a very good Pizza these days. They seem to have matured finally. I expect good value for money at Nik’s though.
I came to this post and then remembered it! Actually this is a big grouse with me. It’s terrible that in a hot country like India one cannot get a non-sweet cold drink. grrrrr!
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