Texas Iced Tea – Original Recipe & History

Texas Iced Tea
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Texas Iced Tea

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

300

kcal
Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a Texas Iced Tea.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 oz Sweet and Sour Mix

  • 1/2 oz Orange Liqueur

  • 2/3 oz Vodka

  • 2/3 oz White Rum

  • 2/3 oz Dry Gin

  • 2/3 oz Silver Tequila

  • 2/3 oz Rye Whiskey

  • 1.5 oz Coca-Cola

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients, except for the soda, into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake the shaker for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.
  • Top the drink off with soda.
  • Garnish:
  • Lemon wheel

Featured Video

What Does The Texas Iced Tea Taste Like?

The Texas Iced taste resembles the standard Long Island Iced Tea. It’s a bit boozier, but it’s not bad. The kind of whiskey used will make all the difference. Irish whiskey is fun because it adds a nice smokey flavor to it. Scotch differs depending on the manufacture and region, but softer, milder scotch is a miss. It just gets lost. Any smoother whiskeys, regardless of style, are pointless in this cocktail. Bourbon is toasted caramel flavors, but it too is a bit weak in the Texas Iced Tea. The best whiskey for a drink like this is rye.

The recipe I have provided uses Robert “Rosebud” Butt’s original Long Island recipe with the addition of 1 oz of rye whiskey. I don’t know if the original 1980s T.G.I. Friday’s recipe used rye, but I figured rye would be the best way for the whiskey to make a noticeable difference in such a sizeable boozy drink. Bourbon’s softer, sweeter flavor is a bit lost in the Texas Iced Tea, but rye’s more robust spicier flavor is more noticeable.

The History Of The Texas Iced Tea

The Texas Iced Tea was invented by T.G.I. Fridays in 1980 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its parent company Carlson. T.G.I. Fridays is often mistaken for inventing the Long Island Iced Tea, and while they didn’t, It is still one of the most popular drinks they sell. Although T.G.I. Fridays did create several popular variations. They made four variations: the Sparkling Iced Tea, the Long Beach Iced Tea, the Caribbean Iced Tea, and the Texas Iced Tea. The Sparkling Iced Tea replaced the Coca-Cola with champagne. The Long Beach Iced Tea replaced Coca-Cola with cranberry juice. The Caribbean Iced Tea used blue-orange liqueur instead of clear to give the drink a light green color and left out the Coke. And the Texas Ice Tea added an additional ounce of whiskey.

I understand this is supposed to be a vintage cocktail resource, and while T.G.I. Fridays is not seen as a high-end bar today, it once was. The first T.G.I. Fridays was opened in 1965 by Alan Stillman. Stillman lived on 63rd Street between First and York in New York and, while surrounded by single attractive working women, had a hard time meeting any. Alan liked to go out after work, and believe it or not, many bars in the 1960s still had policies that no women could enter unless they were with a man. Hell, women couldn’t have bank accounts until the 1960s, and it wasn’t the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 that women could get an account without a father or husband to manage it. But back to cocktails. Obviously, not every bar was like this, and some areas were more progressive than others, but there was still a culture of bars being too rough for single vulnerable women. Some high-end bars excluded single women, fearing their presence would distract business-minded men from making deals. Even though prohibition had helped lessen the stigma of women publicly drinking, it still took activists like Betty Friedan and others to fully break down these barriers. Alan Stillman also helped break down these barriers when he opened T.G.I. Fridays, one of the United States’ first singles bar. The original intent of T.G.I Fridays was to offer a welcoming environment that felt like home where single women and men could meet. Women didn’t need to come with a man to enter. They served high-end drinks and well-made American food. Stillman may have been looking to meet women, but he inadvertently helped bring down some of the social barriers American women faced.

Recipe Resources

Texas Iced Tea Article

Original Long Island Iced Tea Recipe

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Tokyo Iced Tea – Recipe & History

Tokyo Iced Tea
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Tokyo Iced Tea

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

300

kcal
Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a Tokyo Iced Tea.

Ingredients

  • 1 oz Lime Juice

  • 1/2 oz Dry Gin

  • 1/2 oz White Rum

  • 1/2 oz Vodka

  • 1/2 oz Silver Tequila

  • 1/2 oz Melon Liqueur

  • 2 oz Lemon-Lime Soda

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients, except for the soda, into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake the shaker for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.
  • Top the drink off with soda.
  • Garnish:
  • Lemon wheel

Featured Video

What Does The Tokyo Iced Tea Taste Like?

The Tokyo Iced Tea taste like a melon-flavored adios. It’s boozy, but the sweetness is not overpowering. Using Midori instead of orange liqueur gives the drink a nice light melon flavor instead of the adios’s citrus-forward flavor. Highbrow cocktail drinkers may turn their noses up to a drink like the Tokyo Iced Tea, but it’s pretty good and worth a try if you like long Island’s or Adios cocktails.

The History Of The Tokyo Iced Tea.

Many sources I looked at guessed that the Tokyo Iced Tea was an invention at TGI Friday, but I could not find anything backing that up. Even those publications said they had no proof and that it was only a guess that TGI Fridays invented the Tokyo Iced Tea since they were famous for selling long Island variations in the 1980s. Although the Tokyo Iced Tea resembles the Adios Motherfucker more than the Long Island Iced Tea. The earliest reference to the Tokyo Iced Tea I could find comes from the 2002 book “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Asian Cooking.” The Recipe in that book is slightly different from the common one today as it uses raspberry liqueur instead of melon liqueur. The melon liqueur version we are used to today first appeared in the 2007 book “10,000 Drinks”. I also don’t believe there is anything Japanese or Asian about this cocktail. Searching for the cocktail in Japanese on google returned zero hits. The Long Island Iced Tea is well known in Japan, but not a single Japanese drink blog or cocktail website produced a single hit for Tokyo Iced Tea or anything resembling it.

Recipe Resources

Tokyo Iced Tea Article

Original Long Island Iced Tea Recipe

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Caribbean Iced Tea – Original Recipe & History

Caribbean iced tea
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Caribbean Iced Tea

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

300

kcal
Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a Caribbean Iced Tea.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 oz Sweet and Sour Mix

  • 1/2 oz Blue Orange Liqueur

  • 1 oz Vodka

  • 1 oz White Rum

  • 1 oz Dry Gin

  • 1 oz Silver Tequila

  • 1.5 oz Lemon Lime Soda

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients, except for the soda, into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake the shaker for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.
  • Top the drink off with soda.
  • Garnish:
  • Lemon wheel

Featured Video

What Does The Caribbean Iced Tea Taste Like?

Like the other Long Island Iced Tea variations, the Caribbean Iced Tea tastes similar but is a bit brighter and more citrusy. It lacks the earthy flavors cola gives to the typical Long Island. The cola flavor in a long island is mild, but removing it means the orange liqueur and sweet and sour are the primary flavors in a Caribbean Iced Tea. If you like booze but want something a bit brighter and citrusy, then the Caribbean Iced Tea is a pretty one to try.

The History Of The Caribbean Iced Tea

The Caribbean Iced Tea was invented by T.G.I. Fridays in 1980 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its parent company Carlson. T.G.I. Fridays is often mistaken for inventing the Long Island Iced Tea, and while they didn’t, It is still one of the most popular drinks they sell. Although T.G.I. Fridays did create several popular variations. They made four variations: the Sparkling Iced Tea, the Long Beach Iced Tea, the Caribbean Iced Tea, and the Texas Iced Tea. The Sparkling Iced Tea replaced the Coca-Cola with champagne. The Long Beach Iced Tea replaced Coca-Cola with cranberry juice. The Caribbean Iced Tea used blue-orange liqueur instead of clear to give the drink a light green color and left out the Coke. And the Texas Ice Tea added an additional ounce of whiskey. Not that I can prove this, but I have a feeling the Caribbean Iced Tea eventually evolves into the Adios Motherfucker. The Caribbean iced tea can firmly be dated to 1980, but the adios started to appear in the late 90s and early 2000s. The two share the same ingredients, and while some of the volumes are different, the two drinks are almost mirrored images of each other.

I understand this is supposed to be a vintage cocktail resource, and while T.G.I. Fridays is not seen as a high-end bar today, it once was. The first T.G.I. Fridays was opened in 1965 by Alan Stillman. Stillman lived on 63rd Street between First and York in New York and, while surrounded by single attractive working women, had a hard time meeting any. Alan liked to go out after work, and believe it or not, many bars in the 1960s still had policies that no women could enter unless they were with a man. Hell, women couldn’t have bank accounts until the 1960s, and it wasn’t the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 that women could get an account without a father or husband to manage it. But back to cocktails. Obviously, not every bar was like this, and some areas were more progressive than others, but there was still a culture of bars being too rough for single vulnerable women. Some high-end bars excluded single women, fearing their presence would distract business-minded men from making deals. Even though prohibition had helped lessen the stigma of women publicly drinking, it still took activists like Betty Friedan and others to fully break down these barriers. Alan Stillman also helped break down these barriers when he opened T.G.I. Fridays, one of the United States’ first singles bar. The original intent of T.G.I Fridays was to offer a welcoming environment that felt like home where single women and men could meet. Women didn’t need to come with a man to enter. They served high-end drinks and well-made American food. Stillman may have been looking to meet women, but he inadvertently helped bring down some of the social barriers American women faced.

Recipe Resources

Caribbean Iced Tea Article

Original Long Island Iced Tea Recipe

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Long Island Iced Tea – Original Recipe & History

Long Island Iced Tea
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Long Island Iced Tea

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

540

kcal
ABV

29%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a Long Island Iced Tea.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 oz Sweet and Sour Mix

  • 1/2 oz Orange Liqueur

  • 1 oz Vodka

  • 1 oz White Rum

  • 1 oz Dry Gin

  • 1 oz Silver Tequila

  • 1.5 oz Coca-Cola

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients, except for the soda, into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake the shaker for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.
  • Top the drink off with soda.
  • Garnish:
  • Lemon wheel

Notes

Featured Video

History Of The Long Island Iced Tea

The Long Island Iced Tea was invented in 1976 by Robert “Rosebud” Butt while working at the Oak Beach Inn in Hampton Bays, N.Y. The earliest recipes for the Long Island Iced Tea I could find come from both a 1986 and 1989 issue of Motor Boating & Sailing magazine. Both columns were written by the magazine’s drink writer John Mariani, who contacted Robert Butt for the articles. In the 1986 issue, Robert tells how he came up with the cocktail, and in the 1989 issue, the original recipe is provided. Mariani States in the July 1986 article:

“Robert… was looking for a new drink for his boating customers. ‘I’m a tequila drinker,’ Rosebud told me, ‘ so I put together tequila, some light rum, vodka, gin, a dash of triple sec, a splash of sour mix, and topped it off with Coca-Cola and a slice of lemon, then served it on the rocks in a Collins glass. Well, the thing tasted just like iced tea, and I started serving them at the bar.'”

In the January 1989 Mariani gives Butt’s recipe and says the cocktail was invented in 1967 instead of 1976. This was most likely just a typo with his flipping the number, but it’s still worth noting.

Recipe Resources

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Long Beach Iced Tea – Original Recipe & History

Long Beach Iced Tea
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Long Beach Ice Tea

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

545

kcal
ABV

29%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a Long Beach Iced Tea.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 oz Sweet and Sour Mix

  • 1/2 oz Orange Liqueur

  • 1 oz Vodka

  • 1 oz White Rum

  • 1 oz Dry Gin

  • 1 oz Silver Tequila

  • 1.5 oz Cranberry Juice

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.
  • Garnish:
  • Lemon wheel

Notes

Featured Video

What Does The Long Beach Iced Tea Taste Like?

Using Cranberry juice instead of coca-cola completely changes this cocktail. The flavor is bright and fruity, giving it an almost refreshing taste. It’s hard to say 4.5 oz of alcohol in one drink is refreshing, but cranberry juice softens it. The Long Beach Iced Tea recipe is exactly like the traditional Long Island Iced Tea except for the cranberry juice. The recipe I have provided uses Robert “Rosebud” Butt’s original Long Island recipe but substitutes the Coke for cranberry juice.

The History Of The Long Island Iced Tea

The Long Beach Iced Tea was invented by T.G.I. Fridays in 1980 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its parent company Carlson. T.G.I. Fridays is often mistaken for inventing the Long Island Iced Tea, and while they didn’t, It is still one of the most popular drinks they sell. Although T.G.I. Fridays did create several popular variations. They made four variations: the Sparkling Iced Tea, the Long Beach Iced Tea, the Caribbean Iced Tea, and the Texas Iced Tea. The Sparkling Iced Tea replaced the Coca-Cola with champagne. The Long Beach Iced Tea replaced Coca-Cola with cranberry juice. The Caribbean Iced Tea used blue-orange liqueur instead of clear to give the drink a light green color and left out the Coke. And the Texas Ice Tea added an additional ounce of whiskey.

I understand this is supposed to be a vintage cocktail resource, and while T.G.I. Fridays is not seen as a high-end bar today, it once was. The first T.G.I. Fridays was opened in 1965 by Alan Stillman. Stillman lived on 63rd Street between First and York in New York and, while surrounded by single attractive working women, had a hard time meeting any. Alan liked to go out after work, and believe it or not, many bars in the 1960s still had policies that no women could enter unless they were with a man. Hell, women couldn’t have bank accounts until the 1960s, and it wasn’t the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 that women could get an account without a father or husband to manage it. But back to cocktails. Obviously, not every bar was like this, and some areas were more progressive than others, but there was still a culture of bars being too rough for single vulnerable women. Some high-end bars excluded single women, fearing their presence would distract business-minded men from making deals. Even though prohibition had helped lessen the stigma of women publicly drinking, it still took activists like Betty Friedan and others to fully break down these barriers. Alan Stillman also helped break down these barriers when he opened T.G.I. Fridays, one of the United States’ first singles bar. The original intent of T.G.I Fridays was to offer a welcoming environment that felt like home where single women and men could meet. Women didn’t need to come with a man to enter. They served high-end drinks and well-made American food. Stillman may have been looking to meet women, but he inadvertently helped bring down some of the social barriers American women faced.

Recipe Resources

Long Beach Iced Tea Article

Original Long Island Iced Tea Recipe

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L.A. Water – Cocktail Recipe

L.A. Water
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L.A. Water

4 from 1 vote Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

335

kcal
ABV

30%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a strong and tasty L.A. Water cocktail.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 oz Lemon Juice

  • 1 oz Blue Orange Liqueur

  • 1/2 oz Raspberry Liqueur

  • 1/2 oz Midori

  • 1/2 oz Vodka

  • 1/2 oz White Rum

  • 1/2 oz Silver Tequila

  • 1/2 oz Dry Gin

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.

Notes

Featured Video

A friend of mine suggested I add this cocktail, and while the stuffy pretentious drinker in me turns up its nose to modern cocktails like this, the laid-back, chill me loves drinks like this. I have no idea who first made this, they are most likely still young and still alive, but I will take a wild guess and say it was first mixed somewhere in LA. The joke is that this funky-colored drink is supposed to look like tap water in Los Angeles. I get that the joke is that the water is gross and funky, but if the tap water there tasted like this, I would move to LA and never look back. No, it’s not vintage, but it’s super good.

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Adios Motherfucker – Recipe

Adios Motherfucker
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Quick Step-By-Step Adios Motherfucker Recipe Video

Adios Motherfucker

5 from 1 vote Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

311

kcal
ABV

11%

Total time

3

minutes

How to make an adios motherfucker.

Ingredients

  • 2 oz Sweet and Sour Mix

  • 1/2 oz  Blue Orange Liqueur

  • 1/2 oz Vodka

  • 1/2 oz Dry Gin

  • 1/2 oz Silver Tequila

  • 1/2 oz White Rum

  • 2 oz Lemon Lime Soda

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients, except for the soda, into a shaker with crushed ice.adios
  • Vigorously shake the shaker for 10 seconds.adios
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all. Top the drink off with soda.adios

Recipe Video

Notes

Is The AMF a Trashy Drink?

I know the name of this is Vintage American Cocktails and that this is not a vintage cocktail, but who cares. The truth is it’s a pretty good cocktail, and contrary to popular belief, it’s not that boozy. Or, if made correctly, it shouldn’t be. This cocktail has a reputation, similar to the Cosmopolitan, for being a trashy club drink young people like to order so they can say they got an Adios Motherfucker. Unfortunately, because of this connection, it’s suffered the same fate as the Cosmopolitan; A good cocktail that ordinary people are afraid to order to avoid looking trashy. Granted, its name is Adios MotherFucker, so it was destined to end up with that image. Another name is the AMF, but saying Motherfucker is a lot more fun.

Adios MotherFucker Vs Long Island Ice Tea.

It’s similar to the Long Island Ice Tea in that it has almost every different kind of spirit in it. Unlike the long island, they are in smaller quantities, and if you’re going by ABV and structure, it’s actually more similar to a John Collins than the Long Island Ice Tea.

What is the Difference Between Cointreau, Orange Liqueur, and Blue Curacao?

Cointreau and Curacao or blue curaçao are all the same liqueur. The only difference is that Cointreau is a brand name, and Blue curaçao is a general term for an orange liqueur with added blue food dye. They are all orange liqueurs and the difference between them and other orange liqueurs like triple sec all comes down to brand names and marketing gimmicks. Bols was the first to manufacture orange liqueur using the bitter oranges from the island of Curacao, owned in the Caribbean. As orange liqueur grew in popularity in Europe, other manufacturers entered the scene. Cointreau marketed theirs as being made from a triple distilled dry beet sugar spirit base, providing a more bright, clean, orange taste. They called it Cointreau triple sec. They owned the name Cointreau but not triple sec, and soon many cheap orange liqueurs flooded the market as “triple sec” liqueurs. Some branded themselves as a “Curacao” liqueur, and others began adding bright-colored food dyes to make them stand out from the others. Cointreau eventually dropped the headline triple sec from its marketing since the term was now associated with cheaper products, but the term endures. That is a brief history of how the market became flooded with triple secs, curacaos, colored curacaos, Cointreaus, etc., that are ultimately the same ingredient but cause so much confusion for so many people. For a more in-depth history of Orange liqueur, please download my app and navigate to the orange liqueur ingredient description. links at the bottom of this page

What Does The AMF Taste Like?

The Adios Motherfucker is a great cocktail. Its taste is similar to a Collins-style cocktail, and the bright blue color is fun. Even though it has the same spirits as the Long Island Ice Tea, it tastes nothing like a Long Island. The Adios has almost a boozy sparkling lemonade taste. The sweetness and soda water helps cut the drink to a more manageable alcohol level and make it (I think) a refreshing cocktail that will still give you a slight buzz.

The Most Important ingredient.

There is no ingredient in the Adios that affects the flavor in any meaningful way. There are so many different ingredients in such small amounts that they all get lost. The only advice I have for this cocktail is not to buy Blue orange liqueur but use one drop of blue food dye instead. Unless you plan to make tons of these quickly, your best bet is to buy a normal clear orange liqueur like Cointreau and add blue dye. Because if you buy blue orange liqueur, you will be trapped into only being able to use it for this and maybe a couple of other cocktails. I have a bottle of blue curacao that I bought maybe 4 or 5 years ago, and it’s still half full.

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