This refreshing Passion Fruit Drink with a hint of Earl Grey tea is like a tropical Arnold Palmer!
“People need convincing to go to Maui??” asked my friend Nina when I posted a photo from the press lunch I was at with the Hawaii Visitor and Convention Bureau. I laughed because she kind of had a point. AJ and I would go back to Maui more often if we could! Longtime readers will remember that we spent 5 weeks in Maui back in 2011, but sadly AJ and I haven’t been back since. So when the Hawaii VCB reached out to me to see if I wanted to learn more about Maui, I immediately jumped at the chance! So, in honor of Hawaii, I opted to make a Passion Fruit Drink with a hint of Earl Grey inspired by an Earl Grey Lemonade I had at the lunch. (Jump directly to the recipe.)
The minute I told AJ about the lunch, he started reminiscent of our time in Maui. The beach. The hiking. The beach. The food. The beach. Really, for us it was all about the beach. AJ has a hard time relaxing and doing nothing EXCEPT for on a beach. And when we opted to go to Maui for the 5 weeks that we did, we ended up going to the beach pretty much every day. Sure there were those excursions around the island, driving to Hana and going to upcountry to taste Hawaiian wine, hiking through bamboo forests and chasing waterfalls, but those were the exceptions to our beach days. It never got old and the days went all too fast.
Hopefully A.J. and I will get a chance to visit Maui soon. Maybe we’ll even have a chance to visit some of the other Hawaiian islands we’ve never been to like Molokai or Lanai. At the lunch I learned about how the Molokai doesn’t have any stoplights (there’s so little traffic on there) and you can bike up and down the 38 miles easily. Apparently you can rent a tandem bike to ride the length of the island, which sounds perfect for AJ and me! He can do the work while I sit behind him letting him peddle. Ha! But until we get back to Hawaii to see the sights, I’ll sip on this passion fruit drink with the a touch of Earl Grey and crank up the heat in the apartment. Maybe I’ll pretend the blasting warm air is really just a tropical breeze passing through my kitchen.
Passion Fruit Drink with a hint of Earl Grey
By Irvin Lin
The key to making this twist on an Arnold Palmer drink is to use passion fruit juice or passion fruit pulp, which you can buy in the frozen section of a Mexican or Latin American grocery store. Make sure to buy 100% pure passion fruit product and not something that is a passion fruit mix, which tends to have extra sweetener like corn syrup added. If you’re in doubt, just turn the product over and look at the ingredients. It should just list passion fruit as the only ingredient. I used Goya Brand Passion Fruit pulp. If you can get actual passion fruit, that even better, just cut in half and scoop the pulp out to use! You can blend if you want or just leave it as is. The Earl Grey simple syrup makes more than needed for this recipe, but save the leftovers and use it for other cocktails and drinks or try brushing it over tea bread and cakes for moisture and an added dimension of flavor.
Ingredients
Earl Grey Simple Syrup
1 cup cold water
1 bag Earl Grey tea
1 cup (200 g) white granulated sugar
Passion Fruit and Earl Grey Refresher Cooler
2 cups passion fruit puree (frozen or fresh)
4 cups cold water
1/2 to 1 cup Earl Grey simple syrup
ice
Directions
1. Make the Earl Grey simple syrup by putting the water in a small saucepan and bring it to a boil. Once it reaches a full boil, turn the heat off, add the Earl Grey tea bag and cover. Let steep for 4 minutes.
2. Once the tea has steeped, discard the bag and add the sugar. Turn the heat back on and stir just long enough for the sugar to dissolve. Let cool, then refrigerate.
3. Make the refresher by mixing the passion fruit puree, cold water and 1/2 cup of the Earl Grey simple syrup. Stir and taste. Add more simple syrup to the sweetness you desire. Serve over ice.
Makes 4 to 6 servings.
Heather (Delicious Not Gorgeous) says
i love these flavors! they’re so refreshing, and there’s no fake fruit going on (i can’t stand how artificial some of those fruit flavors taste in the fruit teas). semi-random, but passion fruit and mango shave ice with coconut ice cream from ululani’s is my favorite shave ice on maui.
Marisa Franca @ All Our Way says
Your photos are always such an inspiration. I looked at your delicious passion fruit refresher photo and slapped my forehead. That was the look I was trying to capture — without success. Not only are you great at your recipes but your photos do an excellent job of portraying those recipes. Happy Thanksgiving to you and AJ!!
Amy says
Oh my, we just received 3 inches of snow, I could use this right now.