Mr. Coffee Iced Tea Maker- the old and the new

This week I had to say goodbye to a favorite kitchen appliance, an old Mr. Coffee Iced Tea Maker.  I first saw one in grandma's kitchen, years before I ever thought I'd be buying her house.  She had a fondness for kitchen appliances, and was on the cutting edge of whatever time-saving trend was being marketed in any particular year.  She was the first person I ever knew to have a Donvier ice cream maker, a bread machine, and a food chopper (I think it was called Oskar, or maybe Emmie).

Hello, Oskar!



Oskar, meet Emmie!

I come from a good Scottish tea-drinking family, so I really wanted an iced tea maker.  A lot of people happily use powdered ice tea mix, but I knew that the tea would taste much better if it was brewed first and then chilled.  Doing that in a Dutch oven on the stove was time consuming but effective.  But the have-it-right-now advantage of the machine sang like a sailor's siren call  to me!

It was a long time before I could convince myself that the appliance was worth buying though.  As I said, I'm Scottish, and the ice tea maker wasn't cheap for someone on a tight budget.  I finally spotted one at a church rummage sale for 50 cents!  It didn't have a manual, but the internet told me how to set the brewer up, and we've been drinking iced tea almost daily ever summer since then.

Sadly, the tea pitcher was not nonbreakable plastic, and over the years it got brittle and finally developed a crack.  My budget having improved some over the years, I went to Walmart and found an immediate replacement.

I kind of miss the sunshine yellow.

Other than having a non-breakable pitcher and a dial to set the strength of the brewed tea, it's pretty much the same appliance.  It does seem to brew more slowly, but that doesn't bother me too much.  This time I paid $20.  But given the fact that Jeffrey will buy bottled or fountain iced tea every day if we don't have it ready to roll at home, I can re-coup the cost fairly quickly.  This is an appliance that will see heavy use, so I don't mind replacing it with a brand new item.   And I use Red Rose tea most of the time, so that has the added bonus of being able to send away for the little collectible figurines that I love.