How to make chai that rivals your favorite coffee shop

• Chai - which is simply the Hindi word for tea - holds great social and cultural significance in India.
• The main ingredients in chai are tea leaves, spices, sugar, and milk.
• Chai lattes are a popular, milkier take on traditional chai.

While you may be most familiar with the chai tea at your local Starbucks, chai is and has been a lifestyle in India for generations. Whether it's a grand ceremony like a traditional Indian wedding or a small neighborhood get-together, drinking chai with your loved ones is a symbol of respect and togetherness in India. But its history is quite complex.

"Chai started out as a colonial conquest by the British, as they needed a place to grow tea outside of China since China held a monopoly on tea production," says Ayan Sanyal, a first-generation Indian American who co-founded the Kolkata Chai Co., a cafe in New York City. "In the early 20th century, the British started a huge campaign to make tea popular amongst Indians. Tea vendors soon started adding their own ayurvedic spice blends to the tea and heavily mixing it with milk, inventing masala chai [a spice-added version of chai] as we know it."

The British import mixed with local flavors became a smash hit and an Indian cultural export in its own right. Now, you can pick up a chai at nearly any coffee shop. But if you want to make your own at home, there are a few things to know first.

The basics of chai

While chai varies wildly from culture to culture, it breaks down into four main components: tea, spices, sweetener, and milk. You can customize each element to get the flavors, spice level, and sweetness you prefer.

Tea

Masala chai traditionally uses black tea, but you can use green tea, black tea, or whatever variety of tea leaves you have at home. You can also purchase special chai blends available online and at specialty grocery stores. There's no "standard" flavor palate for chai, because it will differ significantly based on the tea blend you use to prepare it.

Spices

The taste of your chai is also heavily determined by the type and amount of spices you use, and what combination of spices you include. Spices are what will help give it that unique woodsy and invigorating flavor and separate it from other tea preparations.

According to Sanyal, some of the most common spices used in masala chai include cardamom, black pepper, ginger, lemongrass, mint, fennel, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. Each of these spices has different health benefits. For example, cardamom can improve digestion, ginger reduces nausea, and cinnamon is filled with antioxidants.

Milk

"Whole milk is the best for hot chai, as it contains a lot of natural fats that create a really creamy taste," Sanyal says. While whole milk is traditional for chai, you can really use any milk you like. Switch it up with non-dairy milk like almond, oat, or soy, or make your chai a little lighter with skim. A very traditional variation of chai even uses buffalo milk.

Sugar

How much and what kind of sugar you use is entirely up to you and how sweet you want your chai.

Start with 1 or 2 teaspoons of plain sugar - remember, chai is supposed to be sweet - and you adjust to your desired taste from there. Sanyal suggests experimenting with demerara or brown sugar, maple syrup, or honey if you're looking to try something new.

Quick tip: One 8-ounce serving of chai contains about 25 milligrams of caffeine. For comparison, a similarly sized cup of coffee has around 95 milligrams of caffeine.

What you need

For your spice blend

• 1 to 2 crushed cardamom pods
• 1 2-inch piece of ginger (grated)
• 1/2 to 1 small cinnamon stick( crushed)
• 1 to 3 black pepper kernels (crushed)
• 1 to 2 crushed cloves

For your tea

• 1 cup of water
• 1 cup of milk
• 2 to 3 tablespoons of tea leaves
• 1 to 2 teaspoons of sugar or sweetener

How to prepare chai (makes two cups)

The process of preparing chai looks different from culture to culture, but the basic premise remains the same. Sanyal offers his technique for preparing chai below.

1. Gather key ingredients. This includes your tea leaves, milk, your spice blend, your sweetener of choice, and water. You can also choose herbs like mint for a cooling effect and added flavor.
2. Simmer two cups of water on a stove or in a kettle. Wait for the water to boil.
3. Add your ingredients. Add 2 to 3 tablespoons of tea leaves, 3 teaspoons of your spice blend, and other desired ingredients to the warm water.
4. Brew for 3 to 5 minutes with the heat still on. Two minutes is the ideal length but you can continue brewing until you find your ideal flavor. Generally, it takes 2 minutes for black tea and 3 minutes or more for milky tea to brew.
5. Add sweeteners and milk to taste. You can use whole milk, oat milk, almond milk, soy milk, or any kind you prefer. Add 1 to 2 teaspoons of sugar or sweeteners based on how sweet you want your tea to be.
6. Let it boil and maintain a steady temperature. Most tea varieties will be ready within 2 to 4 minutes. You'll know the chai is ready based on the color. Masala chai will become brownish, while green tea may become golden or slightly green. You can also watch out for the aroma - once you start smelling the ingredients, it's ready.

Quick tip: In some regions, chai tea and chai latte can mean the same thing. But as the popularity of chai has grown, people have come up with variations of the recipe. Now, a chai latte is typically a milkier version of the traditional masala chai. Top with frothed milk for a coffee shop feel.

Other interpretations of chai to try

"One of the best parts about working with chai is how versatile it is," Sanyal says. You can switch or skip some ingredients and get a completely different flavor, or even emulate the taste in baked goods.

• Add ice to make iced tea, and give it even more of a refreshing taste.
• Remove spices for a plain, more subdued flavor for your chai.
• Make chai-spiced rice pudding (Kheer) to eat with "puri" or rice during festivals and holidays.
• Bake cookies with chai concentrate for a unique woodsy flavor.
• Add spices and herbs like black pepper and lavender to create a nutritious variation for chai.

Insider's takeaway

Chai is a popular drink that is not only easy to make, but it also serves a social and cultural function in India. Western adaptations of chai offer more variety and space for exploration. You can pick and choose your spices, switch the type of milk you use, tweak the recipe slightly, and get a fresh drink with a unique flavor within minutes.

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