Chai – the warming spice tea

What is Chai?

In many languages Chai simply means tea. Chai or Masala Chai is also a drink of spices, black tea and milk, sweetened with sugar. My Chai spice mixture contains cloves, black pepper, ginger, cardamom and cinnamon. Some blends also contain star anise. I myself don’t like star anise very much and therefore leave it out. Chai is a very tasty and warming drink for special moments of the day.

You can prepare it like this:

Ingredients:

• 1 lt water
• 2 tbsp black tea (Assam or Ceylon)
• 3 tbsp sugar (or honey if desired)
• Milk as much as necessary
• 2 tbsp Sapori del Mondo Chai spice mix ?

OR

• ½ – 1 stick of Ceylon cinnamon crumbled
• ½ tbsp dried ginger pieces (or approx. a 2 cm piece of fresh ginger cut into pieces)
• ¼ tbsp black pepper
• ¼ tbsp green cardamom
• 5 cloves

Preparation

Bring water and spice mixture to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes, then leave to rest for 10 minutes. Add the black tea and simmer again for 5 minutes, then add the sugar. Add milk as desired. Sieve off and enjoy.

You can as well drink it with milk without adding black tea.

You can replace the milk with rice or soy milk and the sugar can be raw or refined.

 

A faster version

If you, like me, don’t always have time for the whole Chai procedure, there is the following simpler version. The Chai Syrup!

Another advantage – besides the speed – is that you can mix it into cold drinks. And it’s also great as a topping over vanilla ice cream!

You can prepare the syrup and keep it in the fridge for about half a year!

Chai Syrup

Ingredients:

• 1 lt water
• 50 g Sapori del Mondo Chai spice mixture

OR

• 3 sticks of Ceylon cinnamon crumbled
• 1 ½ tbsp dried ginger pieces (or approx. a 3 cm piece of fresh ginger cut into pieces)
• 10 cloves
• 1 tbsp black pepper
• 1 tbsp green cardamom
• 500 – 700 g sugar

Preparation

Bring water and spices to the boil and simmer for 5-10 minutes. Then sieve. Measure the liquid again and add 700 g sugar per litre of liquid and bring to the boil again. Fill into sterile bottles still hot and close immediately.