Arnold Palmer
Iced tea and lemonade, half and half, and nothing else needed.
Photo: Arnold Palmer (923219061) by rick from San Francisco, USA · CC BY 2.0 · All credits
Ingredients
Measures below are multiplied for 6 drinks. Unmeasurable amounts such as “a splash” are left as written.
- 720 ml Measuring jug A measuring jug: pour to the 720 ml line. Iced tea - Brewed strong and chilled - two bags to a mug if you make it for this
- 720 ml Measuring jug A measuring jug: pour to the 720 ml line. Lemonade - Cloudy, sharp homemade lemonade is worth the ten minutes
- 6 wheels Lemon (optional)
Measured in Millilitres (UK). Sign in to read these in American measures. Print a kitchen card at this size.
What the jigger, the spoons and the jug hold, in millilitres and in fluid ounces, is on the measures reference.
Quick version
- Pour equal parts chilled tea and lemonade over ice.
Method
Pitcher (6 drinks)Pitcher (6 drinks) - about 1.44 l of measured ingredients, before ice and dilution.
Timings and per-glass steps below are written for one drink and are not scaled. A full jug takes longer to chill, so stir or shake until it is properly cold rather than by the clock, and pour over fresh ice one glass at a time.
- Brew the tea strong, then let it cool completely - warm tea over ice is a weak, watery drink.
- Fill a rocks glass with ice and pour in equal parts tea and lemonade.
- Stir once, add a wheel of lemon and serve it before the ice has time to melt.
Serve it
Volumes in this story are multiplied for the size above, along with the ingredients. Years, ratios and the capacities of glasses and jugs are left as written.
Arnold Palmer
The golfer is supposed to have ordered this in the bar at a course in Palm Springs in the 1960s, and it went round the clubhouse so fast he started calling it his own. It is the one drink in this book that is genuinely impossible to improve, because there is nothing in it to adjust - which is why it has been quietly served in American kitchens ever since, with nobody bothering to give it a cocktail glass.
Getting it right
The drink is two things and both of them are made, not bought. Brew the tea stronger than you would drink it and chill it properly, because ice in warm tea gives you, at best, cloudy half-tea. The lemonade wants to be sharp: if it is sweet, the whole glass turns into flat lemon squash, and a squeeze of fresh lemon is the correction when the carton has let you down. Everything else is a matter of how much time you have.
Tasting notes
Tart, cold and faintly tannic, with the lemon brightening as it goes. It is the most drinkable thing here - a pint of it on a summer afternoon is no effort at all, and it never asks for an occasion.