Masala Chai

A year ago, I went to India for a couple of weeks. I traveled around to several cities and enjoyed fantastic food and saw some really awesome things. It was a huge leap outside of my comfort zone but I'd say the one thing that made it extra worthwhile was the masala chai. If you've never had masala chai, it's a spiced tea and it's my favorite hot drink. While I was in a really rural part of India staying with some friends, I learned how to make it. This post is long overdue; I should've shared this months ago. But hey, better late than never. Actually, technically I did share this recipe in my video blog, but masala chai is so delicious and so special, it deserves a photo diary too.

Ingredients [serves 2]:
knob of ginger
1 cinnamon stick
2 to 3 cloves
2 to 3 peppercorns
1 cardamom pod
4 to 5 mint leaves
1½ cups water
1 to 2 tablespoons black tea
1 cup milk
+ brown sugar

Start by crushing the spices. Add the ginger, cloves, cardamom pod, peppercorns, cinnamon stick, and mint to a mortar and use a pestle to break everything up. This will release all of the essential oils in the spices, get some juice out of the ginger, and bruising the mint will make it super fragrant.

Boil some water and add the crushed spices right in.

Add in some black tea (the amount you use will depend on how strong you like your tea) and simmer for a few minutes.

Once the tea is steeped, add in milk. Simmer for a couple of minutes.

Strain the tea into a mug and stir in sugar to taste.

This tea is so delicious. The fresh ginger really adds so much spicy fragrant goodness. Of course the other spices also add spicy fragrant goodness, but I'd argue that the fresh ginger is the star. The mint adds a bit of freshness and brightness. The cinnamon and cardamom pod add an inherent sweetness. And the peppercorns give the tea a nice bite.

Here's the recipe page: