Living the sweet life

By Tom Harte

With the arrival of the Fourth of July tomorrow, iced tea season is in full swing throughout the country. However, iced tea doesn't mean quite the same thing in the Deep South as it does up north.

The truth of this state of affairs was driven home to me recently when I stopped at Eva's, the eponymous restaurant founded almost half a century ago by the late Eva Hinson.

In 2011, at the age of 96, she died after putting in a day's work, sitting in her rocking chair peeling potatoes, at her landmark establishment in Summerville, South Carolina.

As I sat at the mayor's table, a memorial to the late Berlin Myers, who for nearly 50 years ate there every day, veteran waitresses Michelle and Robin served me a beverage only lately ever found in the North: Southern sweet tea.

Happily imbibing Southern sweet tea at Eva's Restaurant in Summerville, South Carolina, Tom Harte learns that the beverage, allegedly first concocted in the city, is nothing like the iced tea typically available in the North.TOM HARTE

That shouldn't be surprising anywhere south of the Mason-Dixon Line, which could accurately be thought of as the sweet tea line, and most certainly not in Summerville, for the city claims to be "the birthplace of sweet tea."

Sweet tea, what Dolly Parton in the movie "Steel Magnolias" calls the house wine of the South (it may well have been invented as an alternative to alcoholic drinks), is what Southerners always mean by iced tea.

When they order the beverage, they expect it to be sweet without having to specify it. A concoction of only two ingredients -- tea and copious amounts of sugar -- and often pronounced as though one word, "sweettea," it is as much a part of Southern food culture as fried chicken or grits, whether served in a crystal glass, paper cup or Mason jar.

Sweet tea is not the same thing as iced tea to which a spoonful or two of sugar has been added, which is what you'd likely get if you ordered mere sweetened tea in the North. (You'd probably have to add the sugar yourself.)

Instead, it's made by the gallon and requires the sugar to be added to the tea while still hot so it dissolves quickly and completely.

According to Guinness, this glass of sweet tea, proudly on display in Summerville, South Carolina, the alleged birthplace of the beverage, is the largest ever brewed.TOM HARTE

Summerville's claim to have originated sweet tea may be a bit tenuous, but it is true that the first commercially successful tea plantation in the United States was Summerville's Pinehurst Plantation, which started production in 1888.

There is evidence, however, that people, even farther north, were drinking some version of sweetened tea 20 years earlier, and moreover, the first published recipe for sweet tea appears a good 10 years earlier, in a cookbook written by Patrick Henry's granddaughter -- and it was published in Virginia, not South Carolina.

Still, Summerville holds the Guinness World Record for the largest single glass of sweet tea ever brewed, and there is always a complimentary cup of the elixir waiting for anyone who walks into the town's visitor center.

And I've never had a better glass of sweet tea than the one served to me at Eva's. So whether they actually invented the beverage, clearly the people of Summerville are living the sweet life.

Slightly Sweet Tea (with variations)

A pitcher of Southern sweet tea is always on hand at the welcome center in Summerville, South Carolina, inviting visitors to partake of the beverage allegedly invented there.TOM HARTE

This recipe adapted from Southern Living, surely an unimpeachable source for sweet tea recipes, is for people who don't like their beverages quite so cloying. Honey is easier to dissolve into the tea than sugar and adds some extra flavor.

• 4 cups room temperature water
• 7 tea bags
• 1/2 cup honey
• 4 cups cold water
• 1 orange, cut into wedges
• 1 lime, cut into wedges

Bring 4 cups water to a boil, add tea bags and boil 1 minute. Cover and steep 10 minutes. Discard tea bags. Stir in honey, pour into a large pitcher, add cold water and orange and lime wedges. Serve over ice. Makes 2 quarts.

Cherry Sweet Tea: Prepare as above, substituting 4 cups bottled cherry juice for the cold water.

Mint Julep Sweet Tea: Prepare as above. In a large pitcher, muddle 1 cup packed mint leaves with 2 tablespoons sugar. Add tea and 2 2/3 cups bourbon.

Arnold Palmer/Jack Nicklaus Sweet Tea: Prepare as above. Add 3 cups lemonade to make Arnold Palmer sweet tea. Substitute orange juice for lemonade to make, for lack of a better name, Jack Nicklaus sweet tea.