As you are reading this post today, I am happy to be snuggled up with a warm blanket at a blogging retreat in Park City, Utah. There is snow falling outside our door, good blogging friends are near, and I am happy to be nestling in for some much needed R&R.
I don’t know about you, but it seems like fall has gotten off to a busy start. Busy, busy, busy. Always a little more busy than I’d like. Always trying to work on that. I embarrassingly didn’t even realize that the leaves were changing in Kansas City until I saw it on Instagram!!
Still, the transition into fall is one of my absolute favorite times of the year, and I have been trying to take small moments during the day to pause and soak it up. I’ve learned that one of the small habits that seems to always help with this is to cozy up with a warm drink first thing in the morning or at the end of the day. There’s something about holding a steaming hot mug and then taking slow, thoughtful sips that is the essence of comfort and calm.
So today, I thought I would share with you a recipe for one of my favorite comfort drinks — homemade chai tea.
I first learned to love chai back in the day at — you guessed it — Starbucks. I instantly got hooked on the drink and all of those delicious spices, and began stopping by to order an iced chai almost every day for work. Then the $4 daily expense got a little ridiculous. So I learned to buy Tazo chai concentrate at the grocery store. Then (bonus!) I learned that it was sold even cheaper at Costco!
But after years of buying those mega 3-packs of concentrate, I began to get tired of the uber-sweetness of that brand of chai. I loved the spices, but the sugar was too much. So I finally learned how to make homemade chai.
And friends — it is so easy!!!
My version is all based around making a chai concentrate so that you can refrigerate it and keep it around for multiple batches. All you need are a handful of spices and seasonings and about 20 minutes, and then you’ll have plenty of concentrate ready to make as much hot chai or iced chai as you’d like.
But the best part is that you can totally tweak the recipe according to your taste. If you really love the sweetness of the chai you get at Starbucks, by all means, add in more sugar and/or honey. If you like yours really peppery, add in more peppercorns. If you like yours really strong or really weak, that’s the joy of concentrate — you can control exactly how much flavor you get. Bottom line, everyone has their own preferences with chai, so with a homemade recipe you can make it your own!
With the holidays coming up, I’ll also add in that this is a perfect comfort food gift to jar up and give to your chai-loving friends.
Hope you enjoy!
Homemade Chai Tea Concentrate
Ingredients
- 12 cardamom pods, gently crushed
- 8 whole black peppercorns
- 8 whole cloves
- 4- inch piece of fresh ginger, sliced
- 4 cups water
- 4 cinnamon sticks
- 3 whole allspice (optional)
- 2 Tbsp. brown sugar (more or less to taste)
- 2 star anise
- 1 vanilla bean, sliced down the middle
- 1/8 tsp. nutmeg
- 4 black tea bags
Instructions
- Bring all ingredients except tea bags together to a boil in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 15 minutes. Add tea bags and let steep for 5 minutes. Pour mixture through a strainer and reserve the liquid for concentrate, and let cool to room temperature.
- Mix equal parts concentrate with water or milk to make chai tea. Or refrigerate in an airtight container for up to one week.
Did you make this?Let me know how it turned out in the comments below!
To Make Hot Chai Tea:
Combine 1 part chai tea concentrate with 1 part water or milk (cow’s milk, almond milk, soy milk, etc.), and stir to combine. Heat in a saucepan over medium heat until simmering, stirring occasionally. Or heat in the microwave until simmering.
To Make Iced Chai Tea:
1 part water or milk (cow’s milk, almond milk, soy milk, etc.), and stir to combine. Serve over ice.
This look amazing :D I love chai tea.
In these cold Canada COVID days we visit our family and friends at a distance in our back yard around a fire pit with blankets and hot drinks. Hence, I have been trying out various hot beverages (boozy and not) and many chai recipes. After many excellent versions your recipe is the favourite and I love that I can easily prepare the concentrate well in advance and offer dairy and non-dairy without any extra work. We ramp up the quantity of spice (yummy) and use a mix of coconut and cashew milk. I also make a second batch of concentrate by simply adding about a 1/4 scaled new spices to the used spice mixture and letting the second batch simmer longer (about 1/2hr). Thanks.
I’ve tried making this recipe, and mixing it 1:1 with milk makes the latte too watery for me, but adding more milk I lose the flavor. Any tips for how to make this less water and more milk, without losing a strong spice flavor?
Bless you. Such an awesome recipe!
I changed the recipe. I used two cap fulls pure vanilla extract(the real stuff). I used ground all spice and cinnamon. Also I added dried orange peel spice. I brewed luzianne iced tea bags (4 family size). To me it came out delicious. It knocked the spice down a lot from the taxi chai tea I’m used to.
I made this recipe as everyone stated by doubling the amounts. I substituted loose leaf tea. I made one batch of spices and tea, boiled for 15 min, then only added 4 cups of water and made another with the same ingredients, combined the two batches for the concentrated, store it in the fridge. Stir and pour one cup of tea concentrate to one cup almond milk add brown sugar to taste and heat on low. It made the perfect Chai Latte.
Just wondering if you would use a grade A or a grade B vanilla bean?
I make this everyday and I’m telling you it’s better than any chai I’ve ever bought from a tea shop or prepackaged.
This recipe is the best masala chai recipe I’ve ever tried. I alter it a bit because I adore strong spices. I throw each spice into my mortar and give em a rough crush. When making the final tea I used 3/4 tea and 1/4 milk (I like it strong!!). With the extra spiciness it benefits from an extra tbsp of brown sugar, too. I’ve made this 4 times in the past month and find myself needing to re-up my spices!
I love it made this recipe at least 5 times, iced and hot, it’s just the best! Love the health benefits of it too.