I love Masala Chai
After spending a couple of weeks across southern central India, from Mysore, Bengaluru to Chennai last year I was hooked.
Masala in Hindi just means ‘mixture of spices’ or simply ‘spiced’, chai is the Hindi word for tea. So, Masala Chai, is simply spiced tea. (So yeh, when you order a Chai Tea Latte you’re actually asking for tea tea milk… 😂).
In any city in india you will see chaiwalas on the street, walla is a word used to indicate that the person is doing a job, so, chaiwala is a person who serves tea (and normally charges for it).
You will pay 5–10 rupees (6–10p) for a cup of masala chai and I find myself completely transfixed watching them prepare it, the smell of the spices filling the bustling streets.
When ready, they traditionally (although this is slowly falling out of fashion to less sustainable plastic) they pour the chai into a kulhar which is a disposable clay cup. They say, when you are finished, throw the cup to the ground from where it came.
After speaking to many friends, you soon realise that there isn’t a recipe for masala chai. There are about 1 billion adults in India, and I think each one of them has at least 2 recipes.
So, this is my recipe, put together with advice from a few friends. You should tweak this and experiment with spices you love. This is what I make, and it’s the closest I got to my memory of the chai I drank while I was there.
I think there is something a little poetic about this recipe, a combination of hints, tips and stories from friends and colleagues. You learn very quickly, that tea is such a central part of Asian culture, in the way people connect and collaborate. So, don’t drink it alone, share it with friends and family. Or, perhaps a stranger who is just three cups away from being family.
‘Here we drink three cups of tea to do business; the first you are a stranger, the second you become a friend, and the third, you join our family, and for our family we are prepared to do anything — even die’
— Haji Ali, Korphe Village Chief, Karakoram mountains, Pakistan
Ingredients
I like to make a big batch of it in the morning and keep in a flask all day, so these are the quantities I use and it makes just under 2 litres, you can tweak the quantities as you wish and scale up or down.
- 3 piled teaspoons cardamom pods
- 3 piled teaspoons black peppercorns
- about 1–1/2 of a star anice
- 2 teaspoons cloves
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- 1 teaspoon fennel seeds
- 1 nutmeg
- 6 piled teaspoons of loose black tea (I use Wagh Bakri)
- 1 1/2 litres of cold water
- about 800 millilitres of milk (whole or semi-skimmed)*
- 1 tin of condensed milk (normally just shy of 400 grams)*
*I’m experimenting with some vegan alternatives, try swapping out the milk / condensed milk for 1 litre of full fat coconut milk sweetened with with either honey or maple syrup. Experiment and see how you get on!
Method
Once you start cooking everything things tend to move pretty quickly, so I prefer to get my liquids ready to go.
Start by mixing together your milk and condensed milk, pour in the condensed milk and whisk together really well. You want a total of about 1 litre of liquid, top up with milk to make it a full litre.
Next, get another jug with 1.5 litres of cold water and you’re ready to go.
Put all the spices into a big pan and smash them up a bit. I just use the end of my rolling pin. The aim isn’t to turn them to dust, but to crush some of them to increase the intensity of the flavours.
Now, put the pan on the heat. When using dried spices toasting them in the pan ‘wakes them up’ and really intensifies the flavour.
Toast them for about 3–4 minutes, until they start to pop and jump about (and maybe smoke slightly), then quickly pour over the water.
It’ll give out a satisfying hiss as the cold water hits the hot pan and spices.
Give it a good stir and bring it to a rolling boil, it should take a few minutes. Once it’s boiling, leave it until it starts to take on a deep caramel colour (and also starts to smell amazing). You will notice the cardamom pods will swell up as they absorb the water.
Get your black tea ready, I use Wagh Bakri tea which was recommended to me by a friend and it hasn’t disappointed so far, but experiment and see how you get on.
Spoon in the 6 teaspoons of black tea right into the boiling spices.
Give it a stir and allow to boil for 3–4 minutes.
When it’s done you will be able to see the now swollen tea leaves and it will have a rich brown colour.
Turn the heat down to the lowest setting and wait a minute while you get your milk mixture ready. It might need a quick stir if it’s settled.
Slowly pour in the milk and then stir well. Leave on the lowest setting and allow the mixture to heat through, but don’t let it boil or the mixture can separate (especially true for coconut milk if you are going the vegan route).
Normally after about 5 or 10 minutes the mixture will be a deep tan colour and will smell rich and spicy.
Turn off the heat, give it a quick stir and sieve into another pan. I like to transfer this right into a flask so I can keep it hot throughout the day, but if you are prepping for a group then just serve immediately.
Traditionally, masala chai is served in very little cups. But, I just don’t do tea that way. Enjoy!
