[1] Thai iced tea. In her version, Wife Mama Foodie uses coconut milk instead of evaporated milk. Here’s her recipe (photo © Wife Mama Foodie).

[2] The tea bags are available in boxes of 20 from Amazon and Walmart (photo © Wangderm).

[3] Add boba (chewy tapioca balls) to Thai iced tea. Here’s the recipe from Pineapple & Coconut (photo © Pineapple & Coconut).

Thai iced tea, known as cha-yen (cha is the word for tea), is served in Thailand, Vietnam, elsewhere around the Pacific Rim and in Thai restaurants outside of Asia.

It is made from strong-brewed black tea and sweetened condensed milk, which adds body and creamy mouthfeel.

Brewed black tea is enhanced with spices, such as cardamom, clove, nutmeg, star anise and tamarind, or sometimes just with vanilla. If you like chai tea with milk and sweetener, you’ll likely enjoy Thai iced tea (although the Thai version is sweeter, less spicy, more creamy, and served cold).

For visual appeal, the deep amber tea and bright-white sweetened condensed milk are swirled or layered (photo #1), but not blended into one uniform shade.

While sweetened condensed milk is used in Thailand, the drink can be topped off evaporated milk, coconut milk, half and half or whole milk.

These latter options have no sugar, so you can sweeten the drink as you wish (or not at all).

Here’s the recipe to make Thai iced tea from scratch.
 
 
THAI ICED TEA BAGS: ENJOY THAI ICED TEA MORE OFTEN

We are fans of Thai iced tea, but because of the high calorie count, we don’t have it nearly as often as we’d like, although it always beckons to us from Thai restaurant menus.

We could prepare it at home from scratch, but we never do.

However, EUREKA:

Recently, we discovered Thai iced tea bags, that make brewing Thai iced tea a cinch. They’re called Authentic Thai Iced Tea (photo #2), made by Wang Derm, a Thai food company.

The bags are unsweetened, providing the opportunity to add your sweetener of choice.

Just brew the tea, which has a touch of vanilla, which gives a hint of sweetness without sugar. (The tea does contain FD&C Yellow 6, a food colorant that is used in candy, desserts, preserved fruits, sauces and snacks. This colorant gives Thai iced tea its amber color.)

Chill the tea. Then add something milky, from the traditional sweetened condensed milk to evaporated milk to skim milk (for calories-counters) or other cow’s milk/cream, to coconut milk or other non-dairy milk.

We used our everyday 2% milk and no additional sweetener. The 2% milk made such a satisfying drink, that if we’d had whole milk it would have tasted close to the fully-loaded Thai version. (When your daily milk is lowfat or nonfat, whole milk tastes like half-and-half).

You can order the tea bags on Amazon, or find them at select Walmart stores.
 
 
MORE ABOUT THAI ICED TEA

The quickest explanation is in the names: sweetened condensed milk has added sugar and evaporated milk doesn’t. It is also much thicker: Evaporated milk pours like regular milk, but sweetened condensed milk pours like molasses. They are not interchangeable in recipes, but both can be used in coffee or tea.

Zucchini is at its lowest price of the year: time to get out your spiralizer and make zoodles (zucchini noodles, a.k.a. zucchini spaghetti).

If you don’t have a spiralizer and don’t want to buy one, you can find ready-to-cook zoodles in most supermarkets.

DeLallo created this zoodles recipe using their passata rustica tomato puree, briny olives, and lots of fresh basil and parmesan (photo #2). Try this lighter take on spaghetti and tomato sauce for your next pasta night!
 
 
RECIPE: ZUCCHINI NOODLES & OLIVES

Ingredients For 4 Servings

 
Preparation

1. HEAT 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a high-rimmed skillet over medium heat. Add the entire onion half and sauté on one side for 2 minutes. Flip and sauté on other side for 2 more minutes.

2. ADD the garlic and sauté until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the tomato purée and basil leaves, then cover and simmer on low heat for 30 minutes, stirring about every 5 minutes. Meanwhile…

3. TRIM the zucchini ends and use a spiralizer to create noodles. If you don’t have a spiralizer, use a vegetable peeler to create long ribbons. Place noodles in a bowl and cover with cold water until ready to cook. When you’re ready to cook…

4. DRAIN the noodles and pat them dry. Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add the zucchini and sauté while stirring for 2-3 minutes.

[1] Guilt-free “pasta”: It’s made with zucchini noodles (both photos © DeLallo).

[2] Mix it up and enjoy a quick, flavorful dinner.

How does passata differ from tomato paste and tomato sauce?

Passata is the Italian term for an uncooked tomato purée that has been strained to remove seeds and skins. It is also spelled passato and referred to by its full name, passata di pomodoro, and it can also be labeled “strained tomatoes.”

It has a thicker consistency and a deeper flavor than tomato sauce.

If you need passata for a recipe but can’t find it, buy plain canned tomatoes and process them through a food mill or food processor.

In the U.S. and elsewhere, tomato purée is usually cooked briefly to soften the tomatoes before processing (puréeing) them. Because it is minimally cooked, tomato purée has a mild, fresh tomato taste and a thinner consistency.

Tomato paste is the thickest and most concentrated of the three. It is made by simmering tomatoes for several hours, cooking them down to a thick, rich paste that has a sweet, intense tomato flavor (some find it similar to sundried tomatoes).

Tomato sauce is made with tomato paste, tomato purée, or both (it can also be made from scratch with fresh tomatoes). It often has other ingredients such as carrots, garlic, herbs and onions. You would not want to substitute either product if passata is called for in your recipe.

[1] Use a kitchen scale to weigh your ingredients (photo © GreaterGoods).

[2] Read the directions carefully before you chop nuts, for example (photo © Good Eggs).

If you pay close attention to recipe ingredients, especially for baked goods, you’ve noted that some recipes give measurements in both ounces/teaspoons and grams/milliliters.

While Americans have grown up with the former (and attempts to convert us to the metric system have failed), if you’re a baker, consider going metric.

That’s because baking is a exact science: mixing reactive ingredients creates a chemical reaction. Hence, the cake rises—or doesn’t.

If your butter is hard versus softened, or vice versa, don’t expect the cookies or pie crust to be perfect.

Unlike stove top cooking, where some extra cream or tomato doesn’t matter much, in baking, the balance between fats, flour, leaveners and liquids is critical.
 
 
GET A KITCHEN SCALE

Over the last decade or so, American bakers have found that measurements by weight are more precise than measuring cups and spoons.

The solution is simple: Get a kitchen scale (photo #1).

They’re not expensive, and they don’t take up much room.

If you don’t want a scale but still want to convert measurements, it’s easy to find a conversion app online. Just type your needs into the browser bar, e.g.

 
 
A TIP ABOUT NUTS

If you took high school chemistry lab, you know that the order in which ingredients are mixed is crucial.

It’s the same in cooking: Pay careful attention to how ingredients are listed in a recipe.

 
You’ll get different measurements depending which sequence you use.

While a bit more or fewer nuts won’t really impact your recipe, discipline yourself so that when it counts, your count will be correct.

If you’ve never had a chocolate tequila cocktail, today’s the day: July 24th is National Tequila Day.

Since the Margarita cocktail has its own holiday (National Margarita Day is February 22nd), celebrate with a different tequila cocktail.

Beyond the Margarita, some of the most popular tequila cocktails are:

 
And now, the Mint Chocolate Black Barrel.
 
 
RECIPE: MINT CHOCOLATE BLACK BARREL COCKTAIL

The Mint Chocolate Black Barrel, developed by Hornitos Tequila, uses Hornitos Black Barrel tequila, a premium aged añejo (here are the different expressions of tequila).

First, the tequila is aged in traditional American Oak barrels for 12 months. Then, it spends four months in deep charred oak barrels (the “black barrels”).

Finally, it spends two more months in specially toasted barrels, which engender more depth and complexity.

All this aging produces a rich, smoky flavor and a golden amber color.

It’s Easy to drink and unforgettably smooth, it is an elegant sipping tequila. So if you don’t feel like chocolate today, just pour the tequila over ice.
 
Ingredients Per Cocktail

 
Preparation

1. LIGHTLY MUDDLE 3-5 mint leaves in a shaker. Add the remaining ingredients except the garnish, and shake vigorously.

2. STRAIN into a martini glass and garnish with a strawberry.

[1] Better for dessert than a pre-dinner drink (photo © Hornitos Tequila).

[2] Hornitos Black Barrel is an elegant sipping tequila (both photos © Beam Suntory).

[3] How about some chocolate-covered strawberries to serve with the cocktail (photo © Balducci’s).

A chocolate cocktail is too sweet to serve as an apéritif. We prefer it as an after-dinner drink.

If you want to pair it with dessert, keep the dessert simple. You don’t want flavors that compete with the cocktail, but flavors that complement it.

If you’re a chocoholic, you can serve it with a simple chocolate dessert, like a bundt. Otherwise, consider:

 
How about a plate with three small bites of different desserts?
 
 
>THE HISTORY OF TEQUILA

>THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF TEQUILA

[1] Framboise and raspberry club soda with fresh raspberries.

[2] Lemonade and limoncello with fresh lemon and mint (both photos © RawPixel.com | Pexels).

We were trying to clear out a pantry closet filled with alcohol, which included bottles and bottles of things we rarely use.

 
So what do do with half-filled bottles of scotch, unopened bottles of bourbon, and a dozen bottles of never-used liqueurs?

Give them away. Nobody we offered them to turned them down, even when there were just two inches left in the bottle.

But we did hold back a few bottles of liqueur to try out today’s tip: liqueur spritzers.

We had a mix-your-own cocktail party where the ingredients were:

 
We provided rocks glasses, even though these normally would be tall drinks. But in order to see if you like what you’ve mixed, smaller is better.
 
 
THE RESULTS

A good time was had by all.

 
And a party bonus: Everyone went home with one or more bottles of liqueurs and spirits.

Do you have bottles that are sitting around, gathering dust?

Now you have a plan, perfect for idling on the patio or around the pool.