Indian: Chai 16 by Recipe Cottage

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	Chai 16

		I put a mug/cup of water to boil. Add a 3/4 inch piece of ginger, crushed with a mallet to it and let the water boil a couple of minutes (to get the ginger essence in), then pour over tea-leaves (amt. depends on what tea leaves are used - I use Darjeeling and throw in one and a half heaped tsp) and let steep two mins. or until leaves are settled at the bottom of the pot. Pour into mug add milk, sugar and enjoy! There are 2 methods you could make tea the Indian way. 1) Boil water - nothing is added till the water is boiling. Stop the heat source. Add tea leaves and spices The tea and spices are usually added to the boiling water in a Bone China tea decanter. The decanter is then covered with a tea cozy for around 3-5 minutes (to allow the tea to brew). Filter into tea cups, add milk and sweetener to taste. This is considered the sophisticated method and is used for the more exotic tea leaves. Usually not many spices are added in this type of preparation. By exotic I would say - Darjeeling varieties. 2) Boil a mixture of water, milk (as much as needed for the entire serving). This mixture is then brought to a boil. Once that happens, add the tea leaves and spices and continue to heat - please note that this is the important difference in the two methods - the "hotch potch" is boiled for about 5 minutes and you would have to keep stirring the mixture (other wise it would boil over) Strain the tea directly into tea cups. This method is used for the not so exotic variety of tea leaves - Basically, you depend on the spices to give you the flavor. Spices There are a lot of varieties which are used. Combinations are made usually depending on the taste the individual likes. Ginger Cardamom Cloves Whole white pepper All these are part of mix-n-match variety. All of them need to be ground before added to the tea preparation. A coarse grind should be enough. You need not add all, then again you could - depends whether you like what you get as end product Trial would help you out. My favorite though is a mixture of ginger and Cardamom added to tea. For this I add about piece of ginger (size of a grape) cut in small pieces and 2-3 pods of Cardamom (grind it coarsely - or just powder it with something heavy). This is added for a 2 cup serving.