Starbucks Copycat Honey Citrus Mint Tea aka Medicine Ball
I’m sure I am not the only one whose adult kids call on their commute either to or from work. When you work a full-time job and have young children, you definitely take advantage of every opportunity to multitask.
During one such call, my daughter drove through a Starbucks to order a tea that was new to me—honey citrus mint tea. I asked her about it, and she waxed poetic. “Oh, mom, it’s so delicious. It’s citrus-y and minty with a nice honey flavor. It feels so good on my throat when it’s scratchy.”
I then asked my daughter if she could identify what kind of teas (there were two teabags in her cup) Starbucks used. The bags were clearly marked as “Teavana Jade Citrus Mint” and “Teavana Peach Tranquility.” Well, that was enough to start me googling for a copycat recipe since paying $5 for a cup of tea is against my religion!
I soon learned that Starbucks has cornered the market on Teavana tea bags. I did find them offered on Amazon but at such a high price that it made more sense to just buy the tea at Starbucks. Turns out good substitutes for each are Tazo Zen for the mint teabag and Bigelow’s Perfect Peach. From there, it was just a question of how much lemonade and honey to add.
I was at a disadvantage since I had never actually had a cup of the Starbucks tea. Despite that, I decided to forge ahead and experiment. I started out with a 1-to-1 ratio for the water and lemonade. That didn’t do anything for my taste buds as it was pretty blah. I then boiled 1 1/4 cups of lemonade with 3/4 cup of water. Better, but nothing to write home about. The third time was the charm—1 1/2 cups of lemonade with 1/2 cup of water was really, really good!
My husband happened to be out doing an errand at the time, so I called him and asked him to drive through Starbucks and buy a cup of their tea. When he got home with it, I told him that he was going to do a blind taste test for me. All it took was one sip of each for him to tell me which one was a lot better than the other. You’re probably not going to be surprised when I tell you that it was my copycat version. Score! 🙂
Both of my daughters and I are now routinely enjoying this tea. So, save yourself a lot of money and make this incredibly easy and delicious honey citrus mint tea at home.
Starbucks Copycat Honey Citrus Mint Tea aka Medicine Ball
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 1/2 cups lemonade (I used Simply Lemonade)
- 1 Tazo Zen tea bag (or mint green tea of your choice)
- 1 Bigelow Perfect Peach herbal tea bag (or peach herbal tea of your choice)
- 1 to 2 tsp. honey (I have a sweet tooth, so I use 2 tsp.)*
*One of my daughters doesn’t like anything too sweet, so she prefers the tea without any honey.
Directions
Add water and lemonade to a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.
Remove saucepan from heat and add both tea bags. Let steep for 5 minutes before removing tea bags and discarding.
Stir honey into tea.
Pour into a mug and enjoy.
Source: Adapted recipe from We Are Not Martha