A tall cold one

Summer is here, and with it iced-tea season, so I asked Hina Soni of Hina’s Tea about her tips for making stellar iced tea. This isn’t your mom’s sun tea:

“Our most popular iced teas are the white flavored iced teas. We always use Pai Mu Tan white tea, because it’s relatively inexpensive, flavored with our fruit teas.

“If you were to make a 32-ounce pitcher, you’d use four teaspoons of the white tea and then about six teaspoons of a fruit tea. Let it steep as long as you possibly can, at least 10 to 20 minutes, or you can literally do it for half a day, which brings out all the flavors of the fruit, and then pour it over ice.

“We add whatever local fruits are being sold—currently the farmers’ markets are chock-a-block full of fresh fruits like nectarines. Throw in fresh fruits and it becomes a really nice beverage.

“My current favorite is a pear-black currant with the white tea. It’s just so intense in flavor.”