This is not your yuppie chai latte. This is the real McCoy - or the real chai if you will! The stuff that takes you back to Indian monsoons and fills you with nostalgia. India has a very strong tea culture. If you visit someone, they'll offer you a cup of tea within the first minute of you walking in through the door. There are two very different types of tea though. The strong Indian milky sugary tea is popular in most parts of India except for in the Eastern part, where the lighter Darjeeling tea is more common. "Chai" is the hindi word for tea. So calling this drink "Chai Tea" is the same as calling it "Tea Tea" - awkward!
This is a recipe for the milky-sugary-strong-spiced tea that has many aliases - "Adrak wali Chai" or "ginger tea", Special Chai or Masala Chai. Worth every minute you spend in the kitchen on a wet rainy day and enjoy it over a good book or a movie.
The tea you buy will make or break this recipe. I strongly suggest that if you're going to make this, take a quick trip down to your local Indian grocer and pick up some Brooke Bond Red Label tea. Step away from those nasty little tea bags called chai something or the other, you want the trusty red box of loose leaf black Brooke Bond Red Label Tea
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The tea you buy will make or break this recipe. I strongly suggest that if you're going to make this, take a quick trip down to your local Indian grocer and pick up some Brooke Bond Red Label tea. Step away from those nasty little tea bags called chai something or the other, you want the trusty red box of loose leaf black Brooke Bond Red Label Tea
!Yield - Serves 2
Total Time - 15 Minutes
Ingredients
2-3 Teaspoons, Black tea - Brook Bond Red Label Tea
1-2 inch piece of Ginger
3-4 Cardamom pods
2 Cups Water
1.5 Cups Milk
4 Teaspoons Sugar
Method
Clean the ginger and pound it roughly.
Pound the cardamoms.
In a saucepan, add two cups of water and bring to a rapid boil along with the ginger and cardamom. This helps steep in the flavors of ginger and cardamom in the hot water. Don't add the tea leaves yet.
Once, the water is boiling rapidly, add the tea leaves. Reduce the heat down to medium and continue to simmer for another 6-7 minutes.
Add the milk and continue to boil it all together. Be careful to not let the milk boil over!
Add some sugar and strain. This tea tastes better with a bit of sugar.
Enjoy!
Thanks a ton Bach. I looked up so many recipes for masala chai but it was not the taste i was lookin for. Ur recipe gave me my peefect masala chai!
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