Hot Dish: Blue Heron’s refreshing iced tea latte

Blue Heron proprietor Matthew Paratore with the tea parlor's  lineup of red, white and blue iced tea lattes, and dry tea leaves below. (Amy Sowder photos)

By AMY SOWDER

While a Mount Kisco Metro-North train clickety-clacked through the humid 90-degree air outside a nearby café window, something refreshing and luxurious was happening within, where a few guests perched on barstools cushioned in nailhead-trimmed vanilla leather while Frank Sinatra crooned over the café speaker.

As they watched, Blue Heron Tea and Coffee Company proprietor Matthew Paratore scooped dense clouds of steamed, lightly frothed, creamy milk out of a stainless steel pitcher. That creaminess folded onto itself in decadent, lazy layers atop iced tea. 

“It’s all about that mouthfeel on your first sip,” Paratore said. “I like to pile it on above the rim so on that initial sip, you really get that creamy, cool milk texture. And I like the visual of the milk cascading down because it shows the different densities of each liquid.”

With the coming Independence Day holiday in mind, Paratore crafted three tea latte varieties in red, white, and blue shades.

Blue Heron’s most popular flavor of iced tea — pure and simple — is the hibiscus tea. The flower’s dried petals are a vivid red-pink and taste bright, fruity and tart, without any sugar or other sweeteners. To make an iced latte version, Paratore pairs the hibiscus with lavender syrup, and then tops it with his latte-style milk. Hibiscus tea is also popular in the café’s cold brew palmers, which combine iced tea with smooth, cold brew coffee.

For the white shade of this patriotic lineup, Paratore swerves down a savory path by choosing a sage lavender white tea. The tea blend has white peony, sage, lavender, lemon, verbena, orange peel, lemon extract and blue cornflower.

“It’s really popular as a hot tea,” Paratore said. 

Then comes a restrained simple syrup, as the tea blend has enough going on.

The good ol’ blue in this equation offers a whiff of old-world sophistication with a blue bellini tea, inspired by the classic Italian cocktail of peach purée and Prosecco. The tea version is the second-most popular plain iced tea at Blue Heron. The blend is filled with pineapple pieces, white peony, butterfly pea flower, lemon myrtle, orange peel, peach flavors and orange flavors. Paratore pairs this blue beauty with classic vanilla syrup.

The idea came a few weeks before summer slammed into Mount Kisco, when a trio came in and were sampling different drinks and pastries on the menu, and then they asked Paratore to create something new for them.

“They wanted it to be cold, and they wanted it to not be coffee,” he said, shrugging. “It sounds simple, but that’s what it was.”

Paratore loves the classics, especially the style and aesthetic of the 1940s. He worked in New York City’s fashion garment industry before shifting to vintage-styled cigar lounges, cafés, soda fountains and luncheonettes.

The tea parlor’s vanilla-and-sage wainscoted walls are adorned with framed sheet music cover art from the 1890s and 1910s, and the original pressed-tin ceiling with garland crown molding hovers above a functioning black rotary phone, wind-up clock, vintage scales, and a gleaming hammered copper espresso machine in a 1905 Victoria Arduino-patented design.

Blue Heron Tea and Coffee Company, named after the birds Paratore has long admired at nearby lakes in his neighborhood, held a soft opening in summer 2024 in the former barber shop. The family-owned building was erected in the 1930s. 

Today, the building is anchored by Chase Bank and has a tailor, florist, hair studio, law offices and bodega all overlooking the train station parking lot and the downtown clock tower peering over Kirby Plaza.

Likewise, these tea lattes can be as versatile as the 30-plus tea varieties that line the café, but Paratore brews four or five teas to pour over ice that meet most needs. He sources the mostly USDA-certified organic and Kosher-certified teas directly from a New York-based importer he knows and trusts. He steeps the tea starting at a low temperature, about 175 degrees, for 24 hours, in a way similar to cold brew coffee. Normally, delicate whites and greens are the only hot teas that need the lighter temps. Oolongs steep at 185 degrees, blacks at 195, and herbals at about 200. He often has chamomile-ginger and persimmon-green tea ready for ice.

Once the tea is steeped, Paratore pours it over ice. 

Quickly, before the ice melts, he steams a small silver pitcher of whole milk, tilting the pitcher against the steam wand at a 45-degree angle, and deep enough for the wand to be in the middle of the milk, not too close to the surface, and not touching the bottom. He steams the milk to between 139 to 141 degrees. Paratore originally tested the milk with a pocket thermometer, but he’s been doing it so long, now “I can test it with my hands,” he said. “To me, the milk has a really nice texture and sweetness to it at 140 degrees. If you add too much more heat to the milk, the lactate breaks down and you lose the sweetness of the milk.”

Once the integrated micro-foamed latte-style milk is all whipped and creamy, Paratore lets it cool and rest while he adds syrup to the iced tea. Caramel, maple and hazelnut syrups are also on hand, if simple, vanilla or lavender aren’t preferred. He stirs the mixture with a long swirled bar spoon, which chills the drink even faster without the vigour that might make the ice melt more. 

Then it’s time to spoon on that luxurious latte milk, where the lightest cream has risen to the top. This milk has more density than cappuccino foam, creating a velvety consistency to land on your tongue.

Yet this summery beverage line is geared toward both adults and children who crave a cold concoction that’s a little different from the traditional curated classics created at this shop. 

“Delicious, especially on a day like this,” said Antoinette Baez, owner of Hair Essentials Studio next door, sipping on her iced hibiscus-lavender tea latte while heading out the door, into the heat. “Wow, this is so refreshing.”

Editor’s note: The writer manages the social media for Blue Heron Tea and Coffee Company.