What is a Chai tea?
Autumn has arrived and Chai Teas or Chai Lattes are literally flying around your ears, but what exactly is Chai tea? Chai actually just means tea and tea, well you were probably already aware of that. Chai tea is actually ‘tea tea’, but let’s face it, that doesn’t sound sexy at all.
Chai came from India, Pakistan, Tibet and Nepal and is a spicy tea with milk. There are many ways to make Chai tea. Take India for example, where Chai tea is drunk with a lot of sugar and black tea. Here in the Netherlands they often choose honey and (vegetable) milk, sometimes supplemented with black tea or even rooibos tea. As long as the spices are in it, you can call any of these Chai tea shapes Chai tea latte. The composition of these spices may differ per brand/store and of course per country. What often corresponds is that a lot of sugar is added to the mix, sometimes up to 50% of the composition!
In the recipe for Chai tea latte version from the Tea Brewery we use our Chai spice mix and black Assam tea.
The Tea Brewery Chai mix
Our Chai mix consists of cinnamon, cloves, ginger, cardamom and pepper and of course a lot of love
CinnamonActually, unlike many spices, cinnamon is not the seed or fruit of a plant, but the bark of a tree. More specifically, the inner bark of the shoots of the cinnamon tree. It gives a wonderful sweetness and provides warmth. And that’s exactly what you need in a Chai tea Latte. In addition, cinnamon is a strong antioxidant and has an antibacterial effect. That is not an unnecessary luxury in autumn.
CloveYou either like it or you don’t. Clove has a fairly strong and “warm” taste and is the big brother of nutmeg. Cloves are also a strong antioxidant and also have a slightly narcotic effect. Do you remember goji berry madness? You know those little red berries that were so popular because they contained so many antioxidants? Cloves contain 400x more antioxidants. Talk about powerful!
GingerGinger also applies here, you either love it or you don’t. I love it myself and like to make a ginger syrup from fresh ginger to drink as a chilled “ranja” in the summer. Delicious. Ginger is warm and spicy. If you use it in combination with a sweetener, for example honey, it provides a deeply intense taste. Ginger is good for your stomach and digestion.
CardamomCardamom pods have a sweet, sharp smell and as soon as you smell the pods you know; these little green herbs are fresh. They taste a bit like bergamot, lemon and camphor. Using cardamom in your dishes enhances both savory and sweet flavors.
PepperDid you know that 20% of the world spice market comes from pepper alone? Can you imagine that a lot of pepper has to be used almost everywhere in the world? Pepper helps against constipation and flatulence and is good for digestion. But it is good for colds and stiff muscles.
All in all, a powerful mix that can certainly be used during an autumn period!
Chai tea latte recipe.
Ingredients for 1 cup:
- 2 tsp black tea
- 1 tsp Chai mix
- 1 cup of milk
- Cane sugar or honey
- 1 tea filter
And this is how you make it:
Heat the milk in a pan over a low heat
Grind the spices briefly until they are all slightly bruised
Place the tea and crushed spices in a tea filter
Allow the filter to steep in the milk over low heat for about 5 minutes
Remove the filter from the pan and pour the chai into a glass.
Enjoy!
