(10 seconds each to read and are almost that quick to prepare)
By Lisa Messinger
Food and Cooking at Creators Syndicate
If you spring into action during spring, what you are probably often doing is entertaining. Whether it's bridal or baby showers, weddings, graduations, picnics, potlucks or tea parties, both the weather and sensational seasonal fare lend themselves to outdoor or indoor memorable springtime soirees.
One economical and easy homemade gourmet touch
that's usually much more cost-effective than using similar amounts of prepared store-bought goods is concocting your own custom iced or hot teas.
Making a splash doesn't involve more than adding some fresh produce, herbs or spices to either plain tea or one of the hundreds of flavors on the market. An added bonus: Most teas are full of antioxidants and among the most healthful foods on the planet.
An easy step for a sophisticated flavor base is to combine equal parts of a plain tea (like black, green or white) with a flavored herbal tea (like peppermint, citrus or apple-cinnamon) before adding fresh ingredients.
Your imagination can run wild or try a few of the following ideas. Either tea bags or loose leaf tea is fine. These can be served over ice or hot. For flavorful iced tea, use one and a half times the tea bags you would for hot tea. Serve sweeteners, like honey and natural stevia, on the side.
Fun fare like this also proves food and beverage preparation can be easy, nutritious, inexpensive, fun - and fast. They take just
10 seconds each to read and are almost that quick to prepare. The creative combinations are delicious proof that everyone has time for creating homemade specialties and, more importantly, the healthy family togetherness that goes along with it!
Another benefit: You effortlessly become a better cook, since
there are no right or wrong amounts. These are virtually-can't-go-wrong combinations, so whatever you - or your kidlet helpers - choose to use can't help but draw "wows" from family members and guests.
Citrus Soother: Combine brewed white tea and lemon tea with finely diced lemongrass, shaved fresh ginger and fresh tangerine juice.
Happily Singing the Blues: Combine brewed green tea and blueberry tea with blueberry pancake syrup into which you've fully mashed fresh blueberries and finely chopped basil.
Pep Squad in a Pitcher: Combine brewed black tea and peppermint tea with finely minced fresh mint and pomegranate or cherry juice.
Apple Elixir: Combine green tea and apple cinnamon tea with apple cider, allspice and almond extract (usually widely available in supermarket spice aisles where vanilla extract is sold).
Special Spring "Sangria": Combine brewed hibiscus tea with chunks of strawberries, plums, nectarines, peaches, pineapples and finely chopped rosemary.
QUICK TIP OF THE WEEK: If your child (or you!) is craving caramel corn or chocolate-covered, nut-infused popcorn - which usually have much more sugar than plain air-popped popcorn - consider this strategy. To get a good dose of the flavor without much added sugar or calories, sprinkle just about a quarter of a serving into a slightly less than full serving of the air-popped popcorn and gently mix. An extra benefit: This kind of technique, repeated in ways throughout the diet, can tame the taste buds, making less sugary items seem the norm.
Lisa Messinger is a first-place winner in food and nutrition writing from the Association of Food Journalists and the National Council Against Health Fraud and author of seven food books, including the best-selling The Tofu Book: The New American Cuisine with 150 Recipes (Avery/Penguin Putnam) and Turn Your Supermarket into a Health Food Store: The Brand-Name Guide to Shopping for a Better Diet (Pharos/Scripps Howard). She writes two nationally syndicated food and nutrition columns for Creators Syndicate and had been a longtime newspaper food and health section managing editor, as well as managing editor of Gayot/Gault Millau dining review company. Lisa traveled the globe writing about top chefs for Pulitzer Prize-winning Copley News Service and has written about health and nutrition for the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, Reader's Digest, Woman's World and Prevention Magazine Health Books. Permission granted for use on DrLaura.com.
