All About Chai: Chai Recipes for All Occasions

By Anu Agarwal

Chai tea is a very versatile drink. Spices and flavors can be combined in infinite ways to create new recipes. The purpose of the book All About Chai is to get you comfortable with making chai tea at home. You will soon find a favorite chai tea flavor and may be even a your own unique chai tea recipe. This book includes 45+ chai tea recipes divided in categories like:

- Single Spice Chai Recipe
- Two Spice Chai Recipes
- Specialty Chai Recipes like Masala Chai
- Healthy Chai Recipes
- Exotic Chai Recipes
- Instant Chai Mix and Masala Mix

Enjoy chai tea anywhere, anytime, and with everyone!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Anu Agarwal
• Release date: Jan 27, 2012
• ISBN: 9780984539666

Anu Agarwal

Dr. Anu Agarwal is a researcher and writer. She has a PHD and has been working in the field of healthcare for over ten years. She also has a business and technology background and understands the business of healthcare. She focuses on studying complex and voluminous topics and putting it simple terms for her readers. Dr. Anu Agarwal is most interested in the topics of alternative medicine and ongoing research in the field. Her aim is to separate fact from fiction and raise people’s awareness about valid and alternative therapies.

Book preview

Tea is a cup of life.

Author Unknown

I love chai. I drank my first cup when I was seven years old and loved it. My mother used to make it for me. She gave it to me mostly when I was sick, but I began to drink it regularly as I grew older. I found it refreshing and easy to make.

I started experimenting with chai after I moved to the U.S. The Internet helped in this endeavor and provided me new ideas. I have included some helpful Web sites in the references section.

First, I tried chai with different spices and herbs, such as cinnamon and basil. Then I moved on to exotic flavors like hazelnut and cocoa. This book includes some traditional tea recipes from India and some recipes that I developed. Try as many types of chai as you like, and I am sure you will come to love chai as much as I do.

The ingredients mentioned in the book are readily available at the supermarket and specialty food stores.

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Chapter 1: What is Tea?

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Tea is the most popular beverage in the world, next to water. There are more than 3,000 varieties of tea, all of which come from one source, namely Camellia sinensis. Camellia sinensis is an evergreen, tropical plant with green, shiny, pointed leaves. It grows at sea level and at altitudes as high as 7,000 feet. It likes a deep, acidic and well-drained soil. Variations in flavors and characteristics of tea are due to the type of soil, altitude, and climate conditions where the plant is grown. Tea processing and blending further affect the taste.

Camellia sinensis is cultivated as a low bush approximately three feet high, for ease of plucking. When the young plants are ready, they are set into the ground about four to five feet apart in rows that are about three feet apart. The bush is trained into a fan shape, with a flat top called a plucking plateau. It takes three to five years for a bush to reach maturity, the time depending on the altitude and the climate.

In spring the first flush of new leaves appears. The bushes are plucked every seven to fourteen days. A tea bush grown at sea level will regrow more quickly after plucking than one grown at a higher altitude, where the air is often cooler.

The History of Tea

Camellia sinensis was originally discovered in China. The legend of tea goes something like this: the Chinese emperor Shen Nung discovered tea during a visit to a distant region of his empire. One day, his servant was boiling some water for the emperor to drink when some dry tea leaves blew into the water. The emperor was a creative scientist and decided to try the brown liquid. He liked the flavor and found it refreshing. Soon, tea drinking spread to all parts of China.

Lu Yu wrote the first book on tea, Ch’a Ching, in around 780 A.D. This three-volume book describes tea growing, processing, brewing, and drinking in detail. It also includes illustrations of tea-making utensils.

Buddhist priests introduced tea to Japan and brought tea seeds for cultivation in Japan. Tea quickly became an integral part of Japanese life. The Japanese perfected the art of tea-making with the help of Ch’a Ching. Over the centuries, this art of making, serving, and drinking tea came to be known as the Japanese Tea Ceremony.

Tea reached Europe in the early 1600s, when the Portuguese developed the first shipping route from Europe to China. They used this route to import tea from China and then shipped it to the rest of Europe. Initially tea was expensive, but it quickly became the beverage of choice for the wealthy. Soon the Dutch also established a direct connection with China and started importing tea. This increased the amount of tea available and soon tea became the drink of the masses in Europe.

As tea was gaining popularity in Europe, the Dutch introduced it to the American colonies. It gained instant popularity; the settlers consumed it in huge quantities. Iced tea was created at a fair in Louisiana. Today, Americans drink 50 billion cups of tea