Long Island Iced Tea: the recipe for the cocktail and tips to make it perfect

Long Island Iced Tea is one of the most alcoholic cocktails in the world and it is around 28 alcohol by volume. Long Island is made with vodka, white rum, tequila, triple sec and gin. Finally, lemon juice and sugar syrup are added. The IBA drink recipe does not include tea among the ingredients but cola, but according to a legend Long Island is so called because it was already drunk during the Prohibition era and the color given to it by the cola made it look like iced tea. The cocktail was born in the 70s thanks to the American barman Rosebud Butts who worked in Long Island, in the state of New York.

How to make a perfect Long Island Iced Tea

Put the ice in a glass and add the vodka, gin, white rum, triple sec, tequila and top with fresh lemon juice, sugar syrup and cola.

Mix well and garnish with a slice of lemon.

Tips

Long Island is a very strong cocktail and  the problem is that often many bartenders overdo the doses, making the drink unbalanced and, therefore, highly alcoholic. Instead it is necessary to better respect the doses to give a priceless taste experience.

Long Island Iced Tea Variants

Once you have mastered how to make this cocktail, you can vary it by making a Long Beach Tea in which the cola is replaced with cranberry juice while, on the other hand, if you want to make a Miami Iced Tea you have to add (in addition to the cranberry juice) also peach grappa.

In Electric Iced Tea, blue curaçao replaces triple sec and creates a drink with a very intense and particular color. Finally, if you prefer an even more alcoholic Long Island Iced Tea, we recommend adding bourbon to the drink to create another variant known as Texas Tea.