chai

Basic Chai Tea

• 1 cup milk
• 2 cups water
• 1 tbsp loose black tea
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 drop vanilla extract
• 1/2 tbsp cardamom
• 1/2 tbsp cinnamon
• 1/8 tbsp ginger
• 2 whole cloves

Place all ingredients except milk in a small saucepan. Simmer for a few moments. Add milk. Simmer for a moment. Strain. Drink.

Bexxta's Chai Tea

• 1 cup of water
• milk
• 1 tea bag
• 2 cloves
• 1/2 a cinnamon stick
• A few cardamom seeds
• A sprinkle of nutmeg
• A few slivers of fresh ginger (can be replaced with a sprinkle of ginger powder)
• Sugar to taste (keep in mind that Chai is traditionally very sweet)

Method 1: *Place all ingredients except milk into small saucepan. Simmer for a few minutes. Add milk. Strain. Drink.

Method 2: Place all ingredients except milk and water in a mug. Boil water. Pour water over ingredients. Let sit for a minute. Add milk. Drink. (The ingredients will sink to the bottom and remain there, but if you're fussy and don't want them there at all you can strain the tea before you drink.)

*Tip: Multiply the ingredients by the amount of cups you may want to drink. You can always heat the tea up later, however be careful reheating the milk.

The tea keeps quite well in a bottle in the fridge. And can be drunk cold.

Henna's Tea

I know how it sounds but don't be crazy, you can't drink henna leaves. I don't know what that'll do, maybe turn you red or brown, or green. Most likely purple. I won't even try.

This is how Henna made tea when she was in a good mood:

• Take 1 cup water and put to heat.
• When it comes to boil, lower the heat and add following:
• 1½ tablespoon sugar
• ¼ tablespoon Chai Masala (wait! I'll tell you how to make this too)
• 2 pinches cardamom powder
• 1 tsp. dried tea leaves (she used Lipton Red Label).
• Allow to simmer till aroma exudes.
• Take a deep breath, take a moment away from everyday troubles and lose yourself in the aroma. But don't take too long.
• Add 1 cup milk, preferably whole milk. Raise the heat (but not too much, else you'll burn the milk!)
• Bring the concoction to boil.
• Lower the heat again, and allow to simmer for another 2 minutes.
• Cover and take off heat. Keep aside for a minute.
• Strain and serve piping hot.
• Sip! don't gulp.

» Preparing Chai Masala: (See? I told you I'll talk about this too)

Take the following:

• 1 cup dried ginger root.
• ½ cup green cardamom pods.
• 1 tbsp. peppercorns.
• 6-7 2" sticks of cinnamon.

Grind all the mixture together into powder. This is Chai Masala. Label it well.

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Half Milk Tea

And this is how my mom makes bed tea every morning:

• Take about 2½ cups of water. Boil it.
• Now add 2 cups of milk and 2 teaspoons of regular tea leaves.
• Add 3 teaspoons sugar. It depends on your taste of course.
• If you want to make it into a special kind of tea - add some grated ginger here. You can also add 3-4 crushed cardamom pods at this point.
• Let if boil.
• Your cardamom/ginger/plain tea is ready.
• Strain and serve piping hot.
• Sip! don't gulp.

All ingredients must be added carefully, as too much of any single ingredient often sticks out like a sore thumb.

You could grind ingredients with a mortar & pestle, however I usually pulverise them into a fine powder with a coffee grinder. This way, you end up having to use less, as their flavour will be more efficiently absorbed by the water/soy milk. But, then again, you may prefer the traditional way of grinding ingredients.

You can put all of the ingredients in a tea bag and steep it in a teapot after heating up your water/soy milk, but you often end up with a papery flavour. To avoid this, I usually brew the ingredients with the water/soy milk in a pot or pan on a stovetop, and then filter them out when pouring.

Sorry, I don't measure anything when making tea, so I'm just going to guess. I suggest that you learn to add ingredients by taste, it's much more fun and you get to know your ingredients a whole lot better.