Causes Of Mixing Tea Ice And How To Prevent It

Illustration of tea ice (Pexels/Marta Dzedhysko)

JAKARTA - Not only brewed and enjoyed in hot conditions, tea is also delicious if you drink cold. However, have you ever seen or mixed tea ice, but the appearance looks cloudy and lacks taste?

A cloudy tea ice will make it less attractive to drink. However, there is no need to worry because cloudy tea ice occurs due to a preventable cause.

Launching from Mashed, on Friday, January 10, 2025, tea is a drink originating from the Camellia Sinensis plant. This plant consists of various compound solutions, ranging from amino acids, calcium, sugar, and tannin (polifenol).

If dissolved in hot water, tea extracts these compounds well, and they are bound together so that they dissolve perfectly. However, when tea is cooled, the tannin and caffeine in tea become less soluble and settle down.

The sudden change in temperature makes the compound clot together, and creates a cloudy look of water. Despite the cloudyness, tea ice remains safe for consumption, but the visual appeal will indeed decrease.

Several methods can be applied to prevent tea ice from having a cloudy appearance. However, some of these methods also have their respective shortcomings.

First, you can try to reheat the tea to dissolve the tan. However, this way you will not be able to enjoy the cold tea, because its appearance will be cloudy if it is cooled again.

Another way that can be done to prevent cloudy tea ice is to brew hot tea slowly with cold water. However, this method can produce dilute tea ice.

A sufficient solution to prevent cloudy tea ice is to brew tea with filtered water (filter water) in the room temperature. Do not use tap water or low quality tea.

Let the tea cool gradually at room temperature, before putting it in the refrigerator and adding ice cubes. This method takes a long time, but the results are satisfying. If you let the tea cool naturally until it reaches room temperature, before adding cold water or ice, tea ice can avoid cloudy effects.