Chai Recipe

[luluisme]

I've had a couple of requests for our Chai Recipe, and I just this morning had an epipheny about it (how to make chilled chai tasty, which the original recipe was not capable of doing), and so I thought I would post about it. (Also: notice the new food porn user pic? It's even a picture of chai!)


Chai Recipe

Serves 3.

This was originally a recipe Bitmonger found online, then he made a couple of changes to it, and I've since been playing with it, so it's time to write it down again.

Ingrediants

3 c. water
Whole Spices (see below)
1 1/3 c. milk (whole, if possible) - Note:, if you're going to serve the Chai cold, you will need an additional ... 4-ish c. of milk)
2-3 T. sugar (optional: Try using vanilla sugar)
2 T. loose black tea. (I suppose you could use bags, but after all the whole spices you need to get, you might as well get some good loose tea. I recommend Republic of Tea's Assam Breakfast)
pinch of nutmeg (optional: Yummy for Hot chat, but I find it is un-tasty in chilled.)

Whole Spices

The idea is to put things you want to taste into your chai. Here are some suggestions:

• 1 stick cinnamon or 1 T. cinnamon chunk. (Powder will not do. Whole spices, please.) You can use a mortar and pestle to grind your cinnamon stick into chunks. Bitmonger always does that. I always don't.
• Scant handful of Black Cardamom pods. (This give it a smoky flavor. Careful, a little goes a long way, and if you scale this recipe up, do not add more cardamom pods.) I use around 8-12 pods.
• 8-12 whole cloves. Like the cardamom, a little goes a long way, and you don't have to increase this if you scale the recipe up.
• Allspice berries, a few (still experimenting with this)
• Other whole spices you would like to taste.

Directions

1. Add water and whole spices to a medium sized pot, and bring to a boil.
2. Turn heat to low, cover, and simmer for 10 minutes.
   (NOTE: This part is really important. The spices have to be infused in the hot water longer than the tea, in order for the chai to have a lovely spicy flavor, but without the tea being overbearing and bitter.
3. Stir in milk and sugar.
4. Bring mixture to steaming, but do not let it boil. This will take a very short period of time.
5. Turn off the heat
6. Stir in the tea.
7. Cover, and let tea steep for the appropriate amount of time for the sort of tea you are using. If black tea, 3 minutes should do it.
8. Strain the mixture
9. If you want to drink it hot, add the pinch of nutmeg, if you're using it, and serve.
10. If you want to drink it cold, let it cool, put in refrigerator, and when you want to serve, double it's current capacity with milk. (So, if you had 1 c. of chai, add another 1 c. of milk.)