Chai (Indian Tea)

- Carla -'s Note:

Chai is basically black tea brewed with selected spices and milk. This is the most commonly used traditional recipe of the classic Indian spiced tea. Chai tastes are personal and the making of chai requires experimenting with different amounts of spices, milk and ingredients to discover the specific blend of spices to suit your tastes. Be sure to use black tea for this recipe, not green or some other specialized variety.

• Total Time: 15 mins
• Prep Time: 5 mins
• Cook Time: 10 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 4

• 2 ½ cups water
• 1 cup milk
• 3 black tea bags
• 3 cardamom pods , crushed in a mortar
• 2 whole black peppercorns , crushed in a mortar
• ½ inch cinnamon stick
• 1⁄8; teaspoon ginger powder (optional)
• 2 cloves
• sugar , to taste

Directions:

1. Once water begins to boil add the cardamom, peppercorns, cinnamon sticks, ginger (if using) and cloves.
2. Simmer over medium heat 2 to 3 minutes.
3. Add milk.
4. Add black tea bags and simmer 4 to 5 minutes or until the desired strength of tea is reached.
5. Strain, serve and enjoy!
6. If you would like to sweeten things up a bit, add enough sugar (or sugar substitute) to suit your taste.

Reviews

[lemoncurd]

A lovely tasting chai. I scaled it down to 1 serving. I made it as is except I left the pepper out and lighly crushed the clove with the back of a spoon. Next time i will add much more spice and still leave out the pepper. Thanx for a lovely warming drink.

[Food nerd boy]

This made a typical spicy chai but easy to drink, too many others use too much cinnamon and cloves, which is just too much flavor. But this one is more balanced. I did however use raw ginger instead of powder and it was more like a mass of two teaspoons, and I used 5 cardamom pods. But very good advice to stay low on the cinnamon. Cinnamon spreads it's flavor very well in low doses anyway, using too much is just nauseating.

[Jenn Z.]

This is similar to chai sheer that I make during Ramadan. I usually leave out the peppercorns and ginger though!