What's your summer grind: Iced coffee or iced tea?

NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Southerners find New Yorkers peculiar for many reasons: They talk funny, are always in a hurry, are shrouded in black on the happiest of occasions and, when it is hot outside, they drink their coffee, of all things, iced.

New Yorkers know iced coffee will be readily available during the summer at their favorite delis and street vendors, just as they count on umbrella sellers mysteriously mushrooming on every Big Apple curb at the first sign of rain.

But if they order iced coffee in Atlanta, Birmingham or Memphis they might as well be asking for Star Trek's Klingon blood wine. After all, everybody knows sweetened iced tea is "the house wine of the South," says Mississippi author John T. Edge, who writes about food and Southern culture.

Scott Cohen, a Bronx native and now executive chef at the elegant Las Canarias restaurant at San Antonio's famous La Mansion del Rio hotel, has found that to be the absolute truth.

Ordering iced coffee in the South is like ordering an egg cream, another New York favorite, he said. "You'll really get a look. Iced coffee is not a Southern thing. Iced tea is a Southern thing. It's in their culture."

Nobody seems to know for sure why Northeasterners go overboard for iced coffee while Southerners remain steeped in traditional tea, but some hypothesized the difference might have its roots in the 1773 Boston Tea Party, when colonists dumped British tea into Boston harbor to protest taxation by a parliament where they had no vote.

Still steamed over tea and taxes, Northeasterners may have eventually turned to iced coffee as their summer drink.

Edge, a founder of the Southern Foodways Alliance affiliated with the University of Mississippi's Center for the Study of Southern Culture, said it could also be that sweetened iced tea is just more of a thirst quencher, particularly since it mixes well with citrus, which the South has in abundance.

"In my area I don't have a single customer that's selling iced coffee to my knowledge. ... Iced tea is it in the Southeast," said Bill Hicks, regional sales manager for Royal Cup Coffee, a major roaster and national distributor based in Birmingham, Alabama.

Hicks said 80 percent of the coffee consumed in the Southeast is drunk before 11 a.m. because of the heat, and consumption definitely drops during the summer. "You will not find (outdoor) coffee carts in the Southeast," he said, adding they seem to be on every corner in New York.

Some people may be under the misconception that iced coffee is a Starbucks invention that only became popular as the Seattle-based coffee cafes spread throughout the United States. But longtime iced coffee addicts pour cold water on that idea.

Jeanne Wilensky, a New York public relations consultant who specializes in food and restaurants, says she has been drinking iced coffee since she was a teenager. "I drink it all year long and anytime of the day. If I get home at 8 p.m. after seeing clients all day the first thing I do is make some iced coffee."

An iced coffee purist, she drinks it the traditional New York way: black, without milk, sugar or flavorings. "I'm not one of those people who likes all that gunk in my coffee."

Still, the spread of Starbucks with its specialty cold espresso and coffee drinks such as iced lattes and blended frappucinos is undeniably having an impact.

While some Southerners consider Starbucks "carpetbagger coffee," Edge, the author of "A Gracious Plenty," said iced coffee is "new on our radar" and the fashionable blended products appeal to a Southerner's sweet tooth.

Ed Howie, marketing director for the Atlanta Bread Company with 80 bakery cafes, mostly in the South, agreed that there is a growing customer demand for iced blended coffee products.

While the chain does not yet have such a product or pre-made iced coffee -- menus specify that customers can pour hot coffee over ice -- it does have a popular "house" latte served hot and sweetened with honey, vanilla, spices and whipped cream.

In contrast, Boston-based Au Bon Pain bakery cafes, with 280 stores, many in the Northeast, not only offers ready-made iced coffee. In many locations customers can get iced coffee out of dispensers that are similar to those containing soda.

"Iced coffee seems to be most popular in the Northeast, particularly New York and Boston and to some extent Washington, D.C.," said Jim Fisher, vice president for marketing. He said the company's Mocha Blast, a frozen chocolate-flavored coffee drink, is "extremely popular" in many locations.

Eric Chastain, who teaches Starbucks employees and customers about coffee, said that while iced espresso and blended coffee drinks are catching on throughout the country, not every Starbucks offers regular iced coffee, a "coffee of the day" that is brewed double strength and poured over ice.

But he said traditional iced coffee can create culinary experiences using different kinds of beans such as Ethiopian Sidamo for a lemon peppery taste and East African Gazebo Blend that has floral, fruity flavor notes.

Even Birmingham's Royal Cup has a "family iced coffee" recipe on its Web site: "Fresh leftover coffee can be frozen into ice cubes and used with regular-strength coffee to make a refreshing summer drink. For a special treat, a scoop of vanilla ice cream gives a wonderful contrast in flavor and color."

Chastain recommends that iced coffee experimenters try using a coffee press, which produces a thicker beverage, and brewing the coffee double strength. "As soon as it brews, pour it immediately over ice. It will give off all these aromatics."

Comparing iced coffee to wine, he said "it opens up a whole new opportunity for food and coffee pairings."

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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