We have sweet tea at McDonald’s in Michigan now, too, and somehow it’s become the default when ordering iced tea. This is frustrating, because Michigan is not a sweet tea state, and having to remember to specify “unsweetened” sucks.
I’m glad sweet tea is an option. I think it’s healthier than soda. Especially when the sugar is cut by ordering half-n-half. Can’t do that with Soda and these days even diet Coke is blamed for diabetes.
My soda consumption has been slashed by 70% since restaurants started offering sweet tea.
The McDonalds’ around us seem to have a system where they line the server, though the spout, with a single use bag. That seems to keep the tea servers clean.
However, they do NOT do the same for the ice or the pop. One time, my pop was served to me in the drive thru with the fountain nozzle in it.
I think we should all probably stop going to McDonald’s.
Yeah , “sweet tea” isn’t like the stuff you get from Pure Leaf or Lipton in the bottle with lemon and sugar "Sweet tea " is much, much sweeter than those
As a displaced Southerner, I urge you to abandon McDonald’s and trot over to Chick-fil-A. Much better tea.
It might also be too old. I can usually tell if tea has been sitting for a while. That’s why unsweet tea is a crapshoot, in the type of restaurant where you pour it yourself - since it’s not as popular as sweet tea, the container doesn’t empty as quickly.
I used to be a connoisseur of “the house wine of the South”. But I’ve switched to half-and-half, because sweet tea, as I understand, is just as bad for you as sodas. Sorry, aceplace57.
even at Southern-themed restaurants, for some reason sweet tea needs more ice to taste cold
I’m a Texan, so I drink my tea unsweetened*, and old tea is my guess for what’s plaguing the OP. If it’s not made relatively fresh (today, at least), it’s not going to be great. I might keep a pitcher of tea at home for a day and a half, but after that we need some new tea. A fast food restaurant isn’t necessarily going to go through their 5 gallons in a day, and if they don’t have a schedule to replace the tea on (or they miss it for whatever reason), it’s going to be pretty bad.
*You can drink so much when it’s hot here, you’d intake 2500 calories a day if it were sweet tea. I don’t know why, but Mexican restaurants have the best iced tea here.
CfA has displaced McD’s in my book. Check this out for a chuckle.