Iced tea - Soda gun vs. fresh brewed

I have a review of one of the best (like, seriously...the BEST) restaurants I've been to, but am trying to properly write it to draw the most complete picture possible.

But for today, I want to share my thoughts on iced tea.  A few of you may have noticed that I make occasional reference to this in a couple of my posts and those who have eaten with me have seen this as well.

I have never had a soda gun iced tea which was worth the ice it surrounded.  All too often it is over-doctored with lemon and sweetener so that it loses all of the tang and refreshingness (shut up, it is so a word) that iced tea is known for.  While it can certainly be said that soft drinks are largely chemicals, soda gun iced tea is nothing BUT chemicals.  Horrifying, horrifying chemicals.

Now, when it comes to fresh brewed iced tea?  Lots of ways to go on this.  If the tea is Red Rose, it's God awful....don't even waste your time.  Somehow, someway, it manages to be worse than soda gun iced tea.  Lipton fresh brewed can go a lot of different directions.  Freshly brewed and strong it's awesome (the bottled Pure Leaf comes close)...not fresh brewed and made to the strength a lot of people seem to like it (read: weak) it's not as good, but still better than nothing.  There are assorted other brands of tea which work as iced tea and they run the spectrum - Red Rose and Lipton are the two biggies, but most of the rest lean towards the Lipton quality.  It's hard to be as bad as Red Rose...you could brew carpet remnants and still have better tea.

The next major kind of iced tea is hot brewed vs. cold.  Typically speaking, you get much stronger flavor through a long brewing process in hot water.  Something about activating the tannins?  Maybe?  Cold brewing can work, but is not as effective.  I think this has something to do with how cold restaurant refrigerators are- too cold and it just tastes off.

All in all, if there is no iced tea, I'll got for Dr. Pepper (and an idea for a future post about THAT occurs...).  Iced tea is always the tops though.