Diana Fayt: Properly spiced & Ready to go

It's chilly out.

Even here in California.

Cold. Dark. Rainy.

I am hunkered down enjoying the quiet of January. Everything has slowed to crawl giving me some much needed time to re-do my poor neglected website. As I rummage through my thousands (this is not an exaggeration) of photo files and write copy I find myself wanting

to sip on something to warm me up.

Chai.

Not the overly sweetened weak oddly spiced kind you often find
at coffee shops or in a box at the grocery store.

But a simple five ingredient chai.
(All my favorite recipes have five ingredients.)

Warmed with ginger and a hint of cardamon and brewed with a strong straight forward black tea. I like to to add milk to soften the tea

and drizzle some honey in it for a touch of sweetness.

Here is how I make it.

Ingredients

5 or 6 1/4" slices of fresh ginger

approximately 15 whole green cardamon pods

3 bags of PG Tips black tea

6 cups of water

milk to taste

(soy, nut or coconut milks are yummy too)

honey to taste

Place the water, ginger and cardamon pods in a two quart heavy bottomed saucepan and bring it to just under a boil. When it begins to boil turn the heat down to a low simmer. Cover the pot (otherwise a lot of it will evaporate) and simmer slowly for about 45 minutes. Do not cook too long otherwise the ginger will be too strong and overpower the balance of the chai.

Once the cardamon and ginger finish simmering add your three bags of PG tips.

(I sometimes use loose leaf black tea from this company if I want a stronger brew.)

Let the tea steep in the infusion for about 3-5 minutes

depending on how strong you'd like it to be.

Then remove the tea bags.

Let the chai cool a bit then pour it through a strainer into a pitcher for storing in the refrigerator.

I use this ceramic teapot to store mine.

When I want a cup of chai, I take my pitcher of brew out of the refrigerator and pour some into a small enameled pan, add some milk and honey, warm it up and then it's ready to sip while I continue uploading photos to my website.

Of course, I like to drink my chai out of one of my new tumblers. If you can't make your own chai yourself, my tumblers are made to go (they fit in a car cup holder) so you can take the tumbler with you to your favorite cafe and order a coffee. ;-)