I love this drink. Would it be better if I buy the already made long island or make it myself?
Online recipe. It’s almost certainly cheaper (and probably better, in terms of matching it to your particular taste) to make it at home. My general problem is that I don’t have liquor at home, and when I do, it’s maybe one bottle… keeping around that many bottles just to make the occasional LIT is overkill… easier to get it from a bar that makes good ones.
It would probably depend on how much the ingredients cost in your area, and if you’re any good at mixing drinks.
Thanks. Seems like there is too many stuff to buy just to make one. I suppose if it was a party, it would be better. I suppose I could always make other type of drinks with vodka, rum, tequilla and gin when I have guests.
What other drinks I can make with Triple sec and
Sweet and sour mix?
What is your opinion on the bacardi ice tea and other ice tea in the bottle?
With the possible exception of Triple Sec, everyone who drinks and has friends over to drink should have vodka, rum, tequlla and gin around (as well as a bottle of sweet and sour). Add some form of whiskey and a few more mixers (like tonic) and you’ve stocked your basic bar.
Liquor doesn’t go bad (well, I may have thrown out a few bottles of Baileys over the years, but this kind of liquor doesn’t go bad). However, this much liquor at once may be a fairly major investment on a tight budget.
Tequila, triple sec and sweet and sour make a not bad margarita. Vodka, Triple Sec and a splash of cranberry and a squeeze of lime is a Cosmo (I like Cointreau instead of triple sec, but triple sec works). Triple sec is one of those liquors that when you don’t have around you wonder why anyone would bother (its really sweet), and when you do have it around, you start to find uses for it. All else fails - throw it in trifle.
I prefer the Three Mile Island Iced Tea -
2 oz Midori
1 oz vodka
1 oz gin
1 oz 151 rum
- Add to glass over ice, fill the rest of the way with sour mix.
The Midori, if you’re not familiar with it, is a bright green melon liqueur. It makes the drink a near-glowing “radioactive” green. 
I use sour mix as a mixer for vodka, especially citrus-flavored vodka, if I want a mixed drink without fuss.
I agree that if you keep a stocked bar then by all means make it yourself but that can be expensive. They’re better if you know how.
If you like the pre-mixed tea then by all means just buy the already mixed drinks. You can get the individual sized “six-packs” for occasional use or the “let’s party” size for when you have company.
My wife used to like a long island tea on occasion. I kept a pre-mixed one in the fridge just for her.
Bartender and all around lush checking in.
You should probably suck it up and buy the ingredients and make it yourself. 90% of the premixed liquor bases are made with rot-gut alcohol that you shouldn’t waste time with at home. There’s a time and place for cheap “well” vodka and gin at you typical late-night college bar but if you actually want to make something for yourself don’t bother with it.
Here’s a analogy for you. You could buy the same quality of ground beef that McDonald’s uses for their burgers and keep it at home for meals yourself, but for only a marginal amount of extra cash you might as well get some decent USDA Prime ground beef. Same with liquor, I’m not saying you need to get Grey Goose and Patron here, but there’s a marked difference between Bellows Vodka and Absolut and Pepe Lopez Tequila and Jose Cuervo. Spend the extra $5 a bottle, worth it.
Those “Long Island Mixes” are basically just cheap vodka, cheap gin, cheap tequila, cheap rum and cheap Triple Sec blended together. You still will be buying your own Sour Mix and Coke. Get yourself a bottle of Absolut, Jose Cuervo, Tanqueray and Bacardi Silver Rum. Those are the foundation of most any home bar and they can be had on sale for between $15 and $20 a piece. You will certainly find many other uses for all of them, so having each is just smart shopping.
Considering those “Hard Ice Tea” drinks you mention, realize that they are entirely different from a Long Island Iced Tea. They are essentially malt beverages, which means they are basically a over sweetened artificial Iced Tea drink spiked with nearly flavorless malt liquor. Imagine pouring a tiny splash of Everclear into a Arizona Iced tea that thats what you’re getting.
They come from the same market which your sweet malt beverages (Smirnoff Ice, Bacardi Silver, Mikes Hard Lemonade etc.) do and not a single one of them contains and distilled liquor in them. The Smirnoff brand has no Vodka, Bacardi has no Rum. They are basically beer with the beer taste removed and replaced with sugar and artificial flavors.
Remember a Long Island Iced Tea has no tea in it, it’s a misnomer. Its a liquor based cocktail, a reasonably potent one at that.
So, here’s your shopping list:
1 750ml Absolut Vodka (or Ketel One, Stolichnaya, Smirnoff etc.)
1 750ml Bacardi Silver Rum (avoid the various spiced or flavored rums for this)
1 750ml Jose Cuervo Tequila (most everything else is either really pricey or utter shit)
1 750ml Tanqueray Gin (different less flavored gins are traditional, but this has the most other uses)
1 750ml Triple Sec (brand is unimportant here, but I suggest springing for Cointreau down the road)
1 Sweet and Sour Mix (This stuff can go bad so get the size appropriate to you, don’t mix it up with plain Sour Mix)
I also suggest getting a decent serving glass 16oz or greater, less and you’ll mess up your proportion of ice to drink. It should be full to teh top with ice before you pour over it. A good shaker is worth having too, though Long Islands aren’t usually shaken.
While we’re at it, here’s a couple Long Island styled drinks which use most of the same base liquors.
Long Beach
1 part Vodka
1 part Gin
1 part Rum
1 part Tequila
1 part Malibu Rum
2 parts Pineapple Juice
Splash of Cranberry Juice
Blue Fucker
1 part Vodka
1 part Gin
1 part Rum
1 part Tequila
1 part Blue Curacao (essentially the same liquor as Triple Sec, just dyed bright blue)
2 parts Sweet and Sour Mix
Splash of Sprite
Both are assembled the same as a Long Island. Happy drinking!