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Wanna know how to make a Long Island Iced Tea? You make a Long Island Iced Tea by mixing together Vodka, Tequila, Triple Sec, Gin, White Rum, Sour Mix and a dash of Coke to get the Iced Tea colour.
Wanna know how to make a Long Island Iced Tea? Well, you find all the booze in your liquor cabinet, pour into a glass and then add a dash of Coke for colour.
At least that’s how it feels the next day and not all that far from the truth either.
You make a Long Island Iced Tea by mixing together Vodka, Tequila, Triple Sec, Gin, White Rum, Sour Mix and a dash of Coke to get the Iced Tea colour.
Wanna know a little more? Let’s get into it.
How to Make a Long Island Iced Tea
Ingredients
- Tequila 15ml / 0.5oz.
- Vodka 15ml / 0.5oz.
- White Rum 15ml / 0.5oz.
- Triple Sec 15ml / 0.5oz.
- Gin 15ml / 0.5oz.
- Sour Mix 15ml / 0.5oz.
- A dash of Coke
- lemon spiral
Recipe
- Add Ice, Tequila, Vodka, White Rum, Triple Sec, Gin, Sour Mix, and Coke to a Highball Glass.
- Garnish with lemon spiral.
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Email to a FriendWhat You Need to Make a Long Island Iced Tea
To make a Long Island Iced Tea, you’ll need the right glass. Traditionally, the cocktail is served in a Highball Glass.
We recommend:
You can’t make a Long Island Iced Tea without all the alcohol in the world. Here are the brands we recommend.
Vodka
Starting with Vodka, there’s only really one brand on the list. Smirnoff Vodka. You can’t beat it for price and it’s great quality too. For making cocktails, that’s all we really need.
Don’t get me wrong, if I was looking for high-end vodka to sip our verdict would be a little different. Then we’d probably look at Grey Goose or even Crystal Head Vodka.
Our verdict:
Tequila
For Tequila, the decision isn’t as clear cut.
In our How to Make a Quick & Easy Margarita cocktail recipe, I examined just which Tequila is the best to use to make cocktails with.
To summarise, we ruled out Fortaleza Reposado Tequila because it was a little too expensive to use as a cocktail ingredient. It’s a perfect Tequila for sipping though.
Ultimately, I went with either Olmeca Altos Tequila Plata or Sauza Silver Tequila. This is because these two brands of Tequila are of great quality for a reasonable price – the perfect criteria for making cocktails with.
White Rum
We have the same situation with White Rum as we did with Vodka. There’s one clear winner here. It’s a brand that’s synonymous with White Rum and comes at a great price too.
That brand of White Rum is of course Bacardi.
Triple Sec
As detailed in our 23 Quick & Easy Cocktails with Triple Sec article, there are a good number of brands of Triple Sec out there at the moment.
For the brand name alone, Cointreau is probably the most popular option. Normally, you can pick a bottle up for around £15 but there’s an offer at Amazon at the moment where you can pick up a bottle for just £12.99.
If you’re going for the best value for money, then you have to throw Bols Triple Sec into the mix too. You can pick a bottle up for £10 on amazon, which is great value for money in my opinion.
Gin
Gin is big at the moment. Very big. This means you have tonnes of Gin options to choose from. Gordon’s, Beefeater, Tanqueray, Hendricks – you name it.
My Gin of choice is Hendricks. I love it and it’s not too expensive.
Preferences aside, I think Gordon’s Gin is the best option here. It’s a well-established brand that’s been around forever and it’s cheap.
Sour Mix
One of the Long Island Iced Tea ingredients that gets overlooked (and possibly replaced by something else in some bars) is Sour Mix.
What is Sour Mix?
Sour Mix is an old school cocktail mixer that has had a recent resurgence as of late.
Sour Mix generally yellowy-green in colour and is made from lemon and or lime with Simple Syrup.
How Many Calories Are in a Long Island Iced Tea?
Origin of the Long Island Iced Tea
Before we go through how to make a Long Island Iced Tea, we’re gonna take a quick look at the origin of the cocktail.
It would be rude not to, right?
The History of the Long Island Iced Tea
The story of the Long Island Iced Tea begins in the 1920s. It was at the height of Prohibition in America. A time where booze was banned nationwide by law. You couldn’t make it, you couldn’t drink and you certainly couldn’t drink it.
But that doesn’t mean people didn’t try.
Somebody going by the name of Bishop created a lethal cocktail, containing Whiskey, Gin, Tequila, Vodka, Rum, and Maple Syrup. The cocktail was created in a small community called Long Island, in Kingsport, Tennesse and was dubbed “Old Man Bishop”.
This is highly regarded to be the forerunner to the Long Island Iced Tea cocktail we know and guzzle today.
But the modern Long Island Iced Tea is widely thought to have been invented in 1972 by a man called Robert “Rosebud” Butt.
Enter Rosebud
Rosebud says he invented the cocktail whilst working as a bartender in the Oak Beach Inn, The Hamptons.
This version contains Vodka, White Rum, Tequila, Triple Sec, Gin, Sour Mix, and Coke.
In his words:
“We had a contest at the bar I was working at, the OBI, and they put a bottle of Triple Sec on the bar and they asked us to make something out of it. So twenty other bartenders and myself went to work and I came up with this drink.”
From there the cocktail took off.
The PBS Inventor Series produced a small film (3mins) about Robert Butt and how he invented the Long Island Iced Tea, which you can watch below:
I think it’s pretty cool how we can see the inventor show us exactly how to make a Long Island Iced Tear right there in his kitchen.
Now let’s get into the written-down version of how to make a Long Island Iced Tea.
Want More Cocktail Ideas?
Now that you’ve learned how to make a Long Island Iced Tea, do you want more cocktail inspiration? I got ya covered! Check out our cocktail recipe page.
Here you’ll find over 100 different cocktail recipes for you to try, for free.
ALSO, we have an entire page dedicated to rum cocktails. And I’m talking rum cocktails of all kinds:
- White Rum.
- Spiced Rum.
- Dark Rum.
You name it, we’ve got it! See for yourselves and check out our rum cocktail collection here.
