The Starbucks Medicine Ball is a soothing mixture of teas, lemonade, and honey that will warm you up and have you feeling better in no time.
Coming down with a cold? Feeling a little tickle in the back of your throat? It's time to hit the Starbucks drive thru and pick up a Medicine Ball tea.
If you're in the mood for other warm and comforting drinks, check out my Caramel Apple Spice or Peppermint Hot Chocolate!
Jump to:
- 🌟 Why You'll Love This Recipe
- 💭 What is a Starbucks Medicine Ball?
- 📝 What is in the Starbucks Medicine Ball Tea?
- 👩🏻🍳 How to make Starbucks Medicine Ball
- ⌕ How to order it
- 🔗 Other Starbucks copycat recipes
- ❓ FAQs/Tips and tricks
- 🖤 Share your creations and follow me on social media
- ✨ Recipe
- 📌 Pin this recipe for later!
🌟 Why You'll Love This Recipe
- It tastes JUST like your favorite Starbucks treat. This is a Starbucks copycat recipe, so it tastes just like the Medicine Ball that you can order from Starbucks.
- This drink will warm you up and soothe your sore throat. It's warm, comforting, and will help to ease your sore throat and other cold symptoms.
- Making it is as easy as brewing a cup of tea. Can you heat some water and brew a cup of tea? Of course you can. Then you can definitely make this drink!
💭 What is a Starbucks Medicine Ball?
The Medicine Ball (sometimes also called a Starbucks Coldbuster) actually started out as a Starbucks secret menu item. Eventually, due to its overwhelming popularity, it was added to the official menu in 2017 as the "Honey Citrus Mint Tea."
It's a warm and soothing combination of two kinds of tea--Jade Citrus Mint Tea and Peach Tranquilty Tea, water, lemonade (Sounds weird, right? Trust me, it works.), and honey. You can also add a pump of peppermint syrup for additional flavor, if that's your thing.
Some people swear by the Starbucks Honey Citrus Mint Tea when they get a cold or their allergies start acting up! If nothing else, this drink is sure to be comforting and soothe your symptoms.
📝 What is in the Starbucks Medicine Ball Tea?
This drink only requires FIVE ingredients (plus one optional extra). Let's talk about them a little bit more below.
- Teavana Jade Citrus Mint Tea: This is a green tea blended with spearmint, lemon verbena, and lemongrass. Because it's a green tea, this honey citrus mint tea has lower levels of caffeine (though there's still some caffeine present). You might be able to find this tea at your local grocery store, but if not, I found mine at Target. Amazon is another good bet.
- Teavana Herbal Peach Tranquility Tea: This herbal tea is flavored with peach, pineapple, lemon verbena, and chamomile. Since it's an herbal tea, this one is caffeine-free! Just like with the Jade Citrus Mint Tea, if you can't find this tea at your grocery store, you can likely find it at Target (or Amazon).
- Lemonade: Steamed lemonade, to be precise. You can use homemade lemonade or pick some up at the store. I know that lemonade sounds like a bit of a strange ingredient here, but it really does work well in this recipe! Warm citrusy flavors are a winner when it comes to cold-busting drinks.
- Honey: Use your favorite good quality honey. Though I've definitely been known to use whatever you can find at the local grocery store in the little plastic bear-shaped bottle, I recently picked up a bottle of honey from a local farm (it's less than 5 minutes from my house!!) and it is *chef's kiss*.
- Peppermint syrup: This is optional, but you can add a pump of peppermint syrup, or a couple of drops of peppermint extract, to your Medicine Ball.
👩🏻🍳 How to make Starbucks Medicine Ball
Start out by warming the water and lemonade. You don't want to boil the liquid, but just warm it up until it's hot and steaming. This can be done in either a saucepan on the stove, or in an electric kettle.
I went with my electric kettle because it allows you to specify the exact temperature to which you heat your liquid. It takes all of the guesswork out of it.
Pour the heated water and lemonade into a mug.
Add the honey to your mug and give it all a stir. The liquid should be plenty hot enough to easily dissolve the honey.
Plop both of the teabags into the hot liquid and let them steep. I recommend setting a timer because each kind of tea takes a different amount of time to steep.
After the tea has steeped, and you remove the teabags, you can add some peppermint syrup or a tiny bit of peppermint extract. And I mean just a tiny bit. Like 2-3 drops. That stuff is potent.
And that's all there is to it! Start sipping and feel your sore throat start to fade.
⌕ How to order it
If you're heading inside of a Starbucks or swinging through the drive thru, you can just order a Honey Citrus Mint Tea! It's been on the regular menu since 2017.
I'm guessing that you could also probably just order it as a Medicine Ball and the barista would know what you're talking about. But maybe just play it safe and use the official menu name.
How to order Medicine Ball on Starbucks app
Maybe you want to order your drink ahead of time via the Starbucks app? I can't blame you! Here's where to find this item in the app.
Here's how to do it:
- Open up the Starbucks app and tap on Hot Teas
- Scroll down to the Green Teas Section
- Scroll over to the Honey Citrus Mint Tea
- Customize it if you want
🔗 Other Starbucks copycat recipes
Looking for more Starbucks copycat recipes? I have a TON! Click on any of the photos below to be taken straight to the recipe, and click here to see the full list.
Maybe you're just in the mood for some other warm and comforting sips? Check out the links below to find more of those.
- Cold Curing Apple Cider from Life Currents
- Parisian Hot Chocolate from Et Food Voyage
- Peppermint Hot Chocolate from A Nerd Cooks
- Ginger Cinnamon Tea from Sweet Tea and Thyme
❓ FAQs/Tips and tricks
Yes! This drink will taste like the Medicine Ball from Starbucks, especially if you use the recommended teas (the same ones that Starbucks uses).
Sure! Just scale the proportions of ingredients up accordingly depending on how many cups you'd like to make.
You could use whatever minty green tea and herbal peach tea that you can find. However, if you want this to taste as close as possible to the Starbucks Medicine Ball drink, I highly recommend getting your hands on the exact Teavana teas that Starbucks uses. I found mine at Target. Amazon is always a good bet if you can't find them anywhere else.
I am obviously not a healthcare professional. Let's state that up front. But lemonade has vitamin C and honey is a natural cough suppressant and has antioxidants. So, that's not nothing! If nothing else, this drink will soothe your sore throat.
Yes! Honey and lemonade (and warm tea-based beverages, in general) are great for temporarily relieving a sore throat.
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✨ Recipe
Starbucks Medicine Ball
Ingredients
- ¾ cup water
- ¾ cup lemonade
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 1 sachet/bag Teavana Jade Citrus Mint Tea
- 1 sachet/bag Teavana Herbal Peach Tranquility Tea
- 1 pump peppermint syrup or 2-3 drops peppermint extract optional
Instructions
- Add the water and lemonade to an electric kettle or a saucepan over medium-low heat. Heat until approximately 185 degrees F. You do not want to boil the water and lemonade, just heat it until hot and steaming.
- Pour the warmed water and lemonade into a large mug. Add the honey and stir to combine.
- Add the sachets/tea bags to the warmed liquid and steep them. Steep the Jade Citrus Mint Tea for 2 minutes and the Herbal Peach Tranquilty Tea for 5 minutes. Discard the sachets/tea bags once they have been steeped.
- If desired, add a pump of peppermint syrup or 2-3 drops of peppermint extract and stir to combine.
Notes
- If you can't find these specific teasa, you could use whatever minty green tea and herbal peach tea that you can find. However, if you want this to taste as close as possible to the Starbucks Medicine Ball drink, I highly recommend getting your hands on the exact Teavana teas that Starbucks uses. Check Target and/or Amazon; I've had luck at both places.
Nutrition
Disclaimer: Nutritional information is a generated estimate and is not guaranteed to be accurate.
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