A make-ahead tea latte that tastes suspiciously like cake

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There are recipes I set out to develop very deliberately, and then there are recipes that begin because I had a box of tea in the cupboard and think, I wonder what would happen if…

This recipe is the second kind.

I’ve been playing with TAZO dessert teas lately, and TAZO Glazed Lemon Loaf tea was practically begging to become a latte. The tea already has that lovely lemon-bakery thing going on. Add vanilla, honey and warm frothed milk, and suddenly it stops tasting merely like lemon tea and starts wandering into lemon loaf territory.

And that was exactly what I wanted.

The best discovery, though, was that I could make a whole pitcher of the tea concentrate to keep in the fridge. I make a sweetened Lemon Loaf tea base, keep it in the refrigerator, and then froth the milk for each cup as I want one.

Hot Lemon Loaf Latte now. Iced Lemon Loaf Latte this afternoon. Future me is delighted with present me. 🍋

Make the Lemon Loaf Tea Base

For this batch, I started with seven cups of hot water and eight TAZO Glazed Lemon Loaf tea bags. I make and refrigerate the tea base in the same 60-ounce glass pitcher design I’ve used for years; this current Amazon listing includes a set of two. They are perfect for lemonade and iced tea as well.

Here’s a tiny tea-making trick that has saved me from fishing around in hot pitchers with a spoon: tie the tea-bag strings together before steeping. When the tea is ready, the whole little tea-bag flotilla comes out at once.

It is embarrassingly simple. It also took me far too many years to start doing it.

Once the tea has steeped, remove the bags and, while the tea is still warm, stir in:

6 tablespoons Torani Sugar-Free Vanilla Syrup

3 tablespoons Nate’s Vanilla Honey for Brunch

The vanilla rounds out the lemon and gives it that bakery flavor, while the honey softens everything and adds another layer of warmth. The resulting tea is beautiful on its own: clear, golden and fragrant.

And While We’re Discussing Honey…

Please steal this trick.

Before measuring honey, give your measuring spoon a very light spritz of neutral avocado oil spray. Measure the honey and watch it slide right out of the spoon instead of leaving half of itself stubbornly attached to the tablespoon.

Ridiculously satisfying.

It’s one of those tiny kitchen tricks that has absolutely nothing to do with being a better cook and everything to do with making cooking less annoying.

I used my iridescent one- and two-tablespoon measuring scoops. The two-tablespoon scoop measures the vanilla syrup in three tidy scoops, while the two spoons together measure the three tablespoons of honey. I love these measuring spoons; they are so pretty!

Turn It Into a Latte

For my hot latte, I poured the Lemon Loaf tea base into a ribbed glass mug and made the frothed milk separately. My exact mugs shown are no longer available, but this similar set of four ribbed glass mugs includes lids and spoons and has the same pretty vertical-ribbed look.

My current favorite milk combination is half 2% milk and half half-and-half. For my mug, I use five ounces of tea concentrate, 2½ ounces of 2% milk and 2½ ounces of half-and-half. I pour the milk and half-and-half into my Nespresso Aeroccino 3, up to the cappuccino line, and hot-froth them together.

That combination turned out to be just right. The half-and-half gives the latte richness, while the 2% keeps the foam light and pillowy rather than turning the whole drink into liquid dessert.

Pour the hot frothed milk into the tea and give it a gentle stir.

The golden tea turns a wonderful creamy ivory, with a lovely cap of foam on top.

And then came the important part.

I tasted it.

It’s my current favorite tea latte.

Not creamy lemon tea. Not vanilla tea with a hint of lemon.

Lemon Loaf Latte. 🍋☕️

One More Thing I Use Constantly

That little black-and-copper disc under my latte in the photo isn’t styling. That’s where my hot drinks actually live at my house. I put it on a mug warmer because I consider drinking an entire hot beverage before it gets cold an unreasonable expectation.

It’s just a simple mug warmer, and I’ve bought the same one twice, but it makes a big difference for me.

I use it for coffee, tea and now, officially, Lemon Loaf Lattes. It is especially useful if you are the sort of person who pours a lovely hot drink, gets distracted by seventeen other things, and remembers it 40 minutes later.

Which is obviously a completely hypothetical person. Just saying…

Try This Next

Once you’ve made a pitcher of tea base, don’t stop at the hot version.

Chill it and try it over ice with cold milk. I serve iced tea lattes in my ribbed highball glasses, which come in a set with four 17-ounce highballs and four 12-ounce rocks glasses. A colorful long-handled iced-tea spoon reaches all the way to the bottom and makes stirring the layers far less precarious.

You can also use the same make-ahead idea with another tea. If you happen to have TAZO Peachy Green in the cupboard, try brewing it according to the package directions, chilling it for iced tea and sweetening it with Nate’s Peach Honey.

Because apparently my tea cupboard has become a test kitchen.

And I’m perfectly fine with that plan.