When you’re making a drink today the most common mixers you’re likely to reach for—for better or worse—are things like club soda tonic water cola or maybe even ginger ale (for the Dark and Stormy fans). Back in the 17th century however such ingredients were in short supply especially for sailors at sea who were dealing with rationing. So sometime in the 17th century British sailors picked up an idea from the locals in colonial India: the tea punch.
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The recipe as discovered by author and historian David Wondrich was simple. It started with aged rum (not the same as dark rum) sweetened with demerara sugar a type of coarse brown sugar. A dash of lemon juice like lime was added to increase tartness and a dose of vitamin C was added to ward off scurvy. Finally the mixture was topped off with strong black tea to keep sailors alert during their shifts. While it was far from a sophisticated cocktail it was certainly more palatable than the watered-down alcoholic rations sailors knew as naval grog.
Depending on what was available on board people could swap out the tea for plain water or other mixed drinks as they pleased. But the basic formula (alcohol sweetener citrus then a mixer) would have remained the same. As one of the first mixed drinks around the tea punch it was essentially the blueprint for all modern cocktails. Who would have thought that tea of all the mixers would play such a huge role in the history of drinking?
According to David Wondrich in his book "Punch: The Delights (and Dangers) of the Flowing Bowl" green tea was flavor-wise much more popular as a mixer than its robust black counterpart due to its milder less acrid flavor. The punch that used green tea as a mixer lacked the sharp "bite" and was much easier to drink (and required less sugar). If you were using black tea on the other hand you might have to use quite a bit of sugar to balance out all the mouth-numbing tannins.
