Sparking Fruit Tea (& A Giveaway!)

A couple months ago I was contacted by the people at Lipton Iced Tea and asked if I'd be interested in sampling their new line of natural iced tea products. My interest was peaked because I find it hard to find iced tea products that are natural and don't contain high fructose corn syrup. This line of iced teas uses real sugar which is key for me and has no artificial colors or flavors. Win win!

The package contained six new iced tea flavors. After sampling them John and I were thrilled. And believe me, I'm not just saying that because Lipton sent them to me, I'd be honest with you if they were gross. Here's the rundown on what we tried and our opinions:

Iced Tea with Blueberry Pomegranate- by far our favorite. It smelt and tasted very fruity. It got better and better with each sip! (Also, this is the flavor I used for my sparking fruit tea above, the recipe is below!)
Green Tea with Passionfruit Mango- Light and summery, perfect for this season.
Iced Tea with Lemon- Classic, exactly what you'd expect of lemon iced tea.
Green Tea with Citrus- Surprisingly good! Neither of us are big green tea fans and we both liked this a lot.
Diet Green Tea with Citrus- Also good, slightly less sweet. I do not drink diet drinks due to the fact that "diet" usually means "chemicals" but this is all natural and really good, doesn't taste diet at all.
Diet Green Tea with Watermelon- This one had the strongest response from us. We were expecting it to be gross and kind of fake, but it was truly awesome and light tasting. We'll be buying this one again soon!

Lipton has paired up with Pandora.com to help people see "the natural side of music." One of the items I received from Lipton was a one year free subscription to Pandora One which offers unlimited listening, no advertising, and other great features. Since I love all of you so much, I'm passing the love on to you! I'm giving away the one year subscription to Pandora One plus two coupons for FREE bottles of Lipton Natural Iced Tea. I know you won't be disappointed, we certainly were not! To enter, leave a comment at the end of the post telling me what drink you enjoy most in the summer! One entry per person, contest ends Tuesday, June 7 at midnight. Be sure to leave your email address so I know how to contact you if you win.

And before we forget, the recipe for the sparking fruit tea! This was delicious, we both loved it and I can't wait to have some with dinner tonight.

Source: Stephanie Cooks Original

Ingredients:
20 ounces Lipton Natural Iced Tea with Blueberry Pomegranate
17 ounces sparking apple juice
1/2 lemon, sliced thin
1/2 lime, sliced thin

Directions:
Combine all of the ingredients listed above. Stir gently. Serve immediately.



Disclaimer: I wrote this review while participating in a blog campaign by Gen-Yknot on behalf of Lipton and received Lipton product samples and a subscription to Pandora One to facilitate my candid review. Gen-Yknot also sent me a promotional item to thank me for my time.

Sangria

As I mentioned previously I had some coworkers over this past week for some drinks/food/chatting. I made a few pitchers of sangria for the event because I figured it was more exciting then just plain wine. Now for those of you that don't know me in real life, I don't drink alcohol. I know many of you are raising your eyebrow and thinking, "At all?! WHY?!" Well... I don't like the taste. Plain and simple. But I love the taste of cookies, cake, ice cream, etc. So if I am going to spend some calories I am going to spend them on something I actually enjoy!

With that said, making sangria was interesting because I couldn't taste it and determine what it needs like most other things I cook. I followed the recipe to a T. The pitchers were pretty much finished, so I assume it went over well enough!

Also, as an after thought, don't mind the picture. My friend Alison came over before I photographed some of the sangria and asked for a glass. I said sure, but then promptly began photographing her glass. How rude of me, right? My poor guest just wanted a drink but I needed my picture. John is so used to not eating/drinking until I am done with my angles but other people aren't as used to my insanity. Thanks for being a good sport Al!

Source: Proceed with Caution

Sangria
750 ml red, Spanish, rioja wine
about 1/2 apple (I used green apples), sliced 1/4 inch thin
about 1/2 orange, sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 lemon, sliced 1/4 inch thick
2 limes,sliced 1/4 inch thick
6 to 8 strawberries, rinsed, stemmed and chopped
1 can Sprite (or similar)

Combine wine and fruit in a pitcher, refrigerate many hours, overnight if possible. When ready to serve, add sprite and mix thoroughly. Serve over ice.

Strawberry-Banana Smoothie

Now this is a recipe that I would usually make and not blog because it is so simple. However I recently started getting positive feedback from a few readers with regards to my Weight Watchers recipes. I know how hard it is to count points while cooking and enjoying yummy meals. So therefore I decided to post this recipe because even though it is simple I know a lot of people need simple 2 point snack/breakfast ideas that are healthy and delicious!

I found this recipe in "Weight Watchers 20 Minute Recipes Spring 2009" and I have been meaning to make it since I first saw the recipe. I needed something healthy and filling this morning to hold me over until lunch and thought this would be perfect. The smoothie was very refreshing and light- perfect for breakfast or in between meals!

Ingredients:
1 cup sliced strawberries
1 banana
1 cup ice
1 6 ounce strawberry yogurt

Directions:
Place all ingredients in the blender- process until smooth. Yields 2 1 cup servings

** 2 Weight Watchers Points per 1 cup serving

Banana Sherbert Smoothie

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Tonight John and I went to our favorite local Italian restaurant and had a great dinner. I wanted to make something small but we certainly weren't hungry or in the mood for anything heavy. I had a tub of sherbert in the freezer and decided to throw some things together and make a smoothie. This came out great- very fruity and light tasting. I highly recommend this. The following amounts yielded one serving.

Ingredients:
5-6 ice cubes
1 small banana, sliced into pieces
3 ounces of orange juice
1 cup of orange creamsicle sherbert (you can sub any kind you have but this one had swirls of vanilla ice cream in it which definitely added a nice creamy element to the drink)

Directions:
1- Put all of the ingredients in the blender, blend until smooth! I used the smoothie and ice crush features on my blender and it came out perfect. Can it get any easier than that?!