Glop in my sun-brew iced tea?

Question

I make sun-tea, using a 1-gallon pitcher with a faucet on the bottom. After it brews, I add 3 tablespoons of sugar. (I'm a yankee.) After about 12 hours, I start seeing stringy brown glop in the bottom of my pitcher. I've disassembled the valve and cleaned it thoroughly, yet I still get glop. I don't get glop if I just put water in the pitcher and let it sit.

It's kinda disgusting. What's causing it and what can I do to get rid of it?

I just experimented. Made another batch, but left it out only 2 hours instead of 6, and didn't add sugar. (I pour a glass and sugar that.) After 20 hours, no glop whatsoever, clear as glass. This lends credence to the yeast or bacteria theory.

Answer 1

It's bacteria. Water, when boiled on the stove or in the microwave, reaches a temperature high enough to kill most bacteria. Sun tea cannot reach those safe temperatures, and letting the water simply sit out in the sun is basically like breeding bacteria and then drinking it.

The snopes.com article on this has the best ways to keep yourself safe, and explains the reasons that sun-tea should be brewed very carefully better than any other article I've read.

Answer 2

Hey Savy dude...Sun tea rocks! But you have to let it sit outside on a sunny day for three hours. If you want Ice tea quickly try Lipton's new "cold Brew" Iced tea. You just put the tea bag into cold water for three minutes and voila! You've got tea that tastes like it's been brewing on grandma's front porch all morning!

Answer 3

I think it is just the tea residue from not being shaken up. Tea is heavier than water so it sinks to the bottom and collects into strings or what you call "glop". If the container was washed well before you started I wouldn't worry ~ just give the sun-tea a swirl and the "glop" will redissolve.

Answer 4

You've got a bottled yeast infection. there are airborne yeast spores everywhere...that's how beer got it's start. the sugar you add is just feeding the yeast.

At best your tea will taste funky but be safe, if mildly alcoholic, however it's still a pretty good bet that you'll end up with something nasty that will make you sick. I wouldn't take the chance.

With sun tea you're just asking for trouble.

If you want to be safe you MUST boil the water when you make tea.

Answer 5

The glop is just residue from the tealeaves that filters out of the tea bags when left standing for a long period.. While it may not look very esthetic, it's still perfectly harmless. You could strain the tea if the glop bothers you that much.

Answer 6

Skip putting it out in the sun, stick the container with the water (filtered if possible) in the fridge with four or five tea bags (or an ounce of loose leaf tea) and leave it in overnight.

Make a simple syrup (http://www.drinkboy.com/LiquorCabinet/Syrups/SimpleSyrup.html)
and add to taste.

It's much safer brewing tea in the fridge and sugar is tough to dissolve in cold water so the simple syrup does a much better job.

Here's another recipe from Alton Brown:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_16174,00.html?rsrc=search

Answer 7

You should NEVER drink sun-tea. You're sitting water out in the sun for hours on end. It sits there and gathers an enormous amount of bacteria, then you drink it. People have gotten extremely ill by doing this. Look it up if you doubt me.

Answer 8

Tea is made of actual leaves, you know. That is just dissolved matter from the tea leaves and harmless. If it bothers you that much run your tea through a strainer lined with cheesecloth or a large coffee filter and it will be filtered out.