Garden Grove Green Tea Sangria

Looking for the perfect accompaniment to your warm weather cocktail hour or backyard barbecue? This green tea sangria recipe makes use of seasonal fruits and sweet, light rosé wine to invoke the feelings and flavors of summer.

Any kind of icy cold green tea works wonderfully to make a refreshing sangria, but we thought we’d accent the flavors of summer by using our Garden Grove green tea with its sweet and tart cherries, notes of jasmine, and hint of vanilla.

Unlike more traditional sangria recipes, we’ll be using a rosé wine instead of red. This will give our sangria a lighter, sweeter taste that will marry well with the fruity green tea. We’ll then add fresh cherries, peaches, and a touch of vanilla syrup to really pump up the flavor. Just before serving, we’ll top everything off with a splash of cherry flavored seltzer for a bubbly finish.

Speaking of which, we’ve talked about making sangria with tea before, but let’s get a refresher on the basics. There are two ways you can add tea flavor to your sangria, and both of them are easy.

The fast way is to bring a cup of wine to a simmer, add the tea, and let it steep for 3-5 minutes to the strength you prefer. Strain and chill the infused wine, then add it to the remaining wine and pour over the fruit you’ve prepared.

The slow method — which we prefer due to the resulting crisp flavor — is to cold brew the tea in the wine. Place the tea in a large, lidded jar, pour the wine over, and seal. Place in the fridge and leave to steep anywhere from four to eight hours. Strain, pour over fruit, and steep a little longer before serving.