we travel full time and film and eat the best local food in the world but today we're at
home and we want to recreate some of that food
today we're making masala chai so spiced tea we've filmed at a number of stalls both in
India and Nepal and the spectacle of these chaiwallas and them making the spiced tea
is absolutely incredible and we are wanting to recreate that street food experience right
here in our home kitchen I'm Thomas and I'm Sheena and we're Chasing
a Plate let's get into it
whenever Thomas and I are filming in India
we make sure we that we stop several times a day to have a cup of masala chai so the
spiced tea ohhhh dhonnobad perfect
it is such an important part of the food culture there especially in the north of India it's
something that you drink all day long and there's just something so special about standing
huddled up next to people at a chai stall and sipping on a cup of chai now these videos
are all about recreating these street food experiences but with what we've got in the
pantry so let me just talk you through what we've got in front of us so we've got water,
we've got milk, we've got tea obviously os just some loose leaf black tea, we've got
sugar always have sugar because they always create a very sweet tea in India very sweet
milky tea and of course the masala so spices so when we were filming in I think it was
Delhi recently we saw them actually crushing up the spices by hand and they were using
ginger there's almost always ginger in the masala chai in India, cardamom so we've got
some cardamom pods here and then I really love cinnamon so I thought I'd add a couple
of cinnamon quills as well but really it's just whatever you've got in the pantry and
whatever flavours you like so we'll pound those up with this rolling pin in a second
and then we've also set up outside and we've got a little gas cooker to use to brew the
tea they almost always use a gas flame in India sometimes it's charcoal but it's mostly
gas and we're outside because I think we're going to make a real mess of this because
we're going to try pulling the tea so stretching the tea and creating a really foamy frothy
brew alright so what we're going to start off with
is just heat some water and milk on the gas stove we're not following a recipe as such
we're just free styling so we've got water there's always a tonne of water used in the
tea and then we'll add some milk to that just however much you like really like if
you prefer a milky tea I reckon you add more milk and if not then add less but we like
a bit of milk keep it creamy I think we'll add a dollop more and then we're just gonna
stick that burner on, oh stick that burner on and then get that boiling is that on?
I think it's all go it's time to crush up these spices so we've
got cinnamon quills, we've got ginger and we've got cardamom so again it's all about
using what you've got at home and using the spices that you like to use so definitely
ginger because there's always ginger in the masala chai in India but you can also add
things like peppercorns and cloves, star anise nutmeg all sorts alright let's just get a
big hunk like that umm add some of these cardamom, cardamom is quite a strong flavour so I'm
just gonna start with two and then we didn't have a mortar and pestle so we found this
rolling pin so that's what we're going to use
this pot's moving all over the place so let's just pop it up on this tea towel and get into
it a bit more like this so this is what the guy was doing when we were filming at that
stall in Delhi so he was just hand pounding the ginger and also the cardamom so the ginger
still had the skin on so I've left the skin on this stuff here too alright so let's add
another little knob of ginger maybe one more cardamom pod and then also the cinnamon quill
and you don't need to like pound it up or um break it up too much you just need to bruise
it I reckon get the get the flavours coming out of them alright I reckon that that's pretty
good let's have a have a smell of it whoaaaa oh the cinnamon and also the ginger super
fragrant now look at the milk over here so this is
the milk and water and in India that's how we've seen it it happen so they boil up the
milk and the water together and then they add the spices into it oh my god oh my god
oh my god okay turning down the heat turning down the heat so the water and milk has just
totally bubbled up but that's what you see when you're on the streets of India you see
this huge frothy mess coming up I'm so glad we're outside okay so what I'm going to do
is add the spices so that's the ginger and then the cardamom and the cinnamon so pop
that into the milk and water mixture and just let it sort of bubble away and flavour it
ohhhhh alright I'm going to turn the heat up a bit more on that now
this outdoor cooking means we've got an issue with wind problems so the wind keeps pushing
the flame down so it's not not getting the bubble going on this mixture so as we said
we're working with what we've got so I've gone with a body board, stool, try and make
a little wind barrier here to get this bubbling away yep already that's working so the milk's
really starting to bubble again and the spices in this milk the smell is unreal and it is
taking me back to being on the streets in India and when you walk up to these tea stalls
you can smell that smell in the air wow and you can smell the spices from here
nothing like a spot of tea and that is the smell I'm getting from this
ohhh okay now we have got a really good bubble happening on there so I think it's time for
tea and sugar so again I'm just gonna guess it just pop some tea in now this probably
isn't the right type of tea but again this is what we had in the cupboard so just some
black loose leaf tea and we've got some sugar now they use a lot of sugar in India so I'm
gonna be pretty liberal with that in fact let's put the whole lot in there and now we
want to get that really bubbling so let that black tea infuse through the milk want to
get it really bubbling so we've gotta shelter it from this wind in all directions
look at the way it's changing colour so now that that tea has gone in there we're getting
that brown sort of tea like stain coming through the milk and so we've kept all the spices
in there for now we are gonna be straining off the spices so obviously this would not
make for good drinking right now it'd be gritty as I've gotta say we've seen some great chai
set ups around the world but I've never seen one involving a body board a planter a stool
like this to hold up your wind break this is quite a unique tea stall but the tea stalls
around the world are fantastic so it's neat making our own little proper one outside here
and this is really starting to brew up good now so it is the smell is just what is insane
super strong with the spices that Sheena put in there and now that tea is really starting
to darken up this liquid okay this colour is coming on really well
now it's getting nice and dark in India you see it bubbling right up right out of the
pot and they turn it down and they let it bubble again we can't get it to do that just
with the temperature we've got and this windbreak it's not quite working but we've had a pretty
good bubble going on so I think it's now time for the fun stuff
I'm gonna get that out of the way move that and I want to pull this tea and get some real
action going on here to get it all frothed up and get all of those spices and flavour
all through the liquid so I want to start I've just got this little
pot that I can get in there I need to get rid of a bunch of these these spices so you've
got all that tea and all the cinnamon and the ginger and the cardamom that's gone in
there which we don't want to be drinking so I need to get rid of as much of that as I
can whoaaaa look how much has come out of there
so the tea is all puffed up so the tea leaves make it look like a lot has been put in there
but that's all the tea leaves and all that cinnamon I'm getting as much of that out of
there as I can and now I want to start stretching this tea so oh man this is terrifying this
is super terrifying so when you're on the streets you see it being stretched from great
heights so let's see how I do I'm just gonna fill up we've got two little pots here
whoa I want to get those bubbles going okay
oh my god I'm so glad we're outside
oh this is so difficult to do in a tidy manner
I've gotta say I'm pretty happy with the aeration I'm able to get here what I've gotta say also
is that I'm really happy we're outside cause I've made such a mess doing this but whoaaaa
it's so good getting this aeration in there
oh my god getting it all frothed up I think
I've gotta pour some tea out before I completely spill it everywhere
look at that so much foam onboard we'll put it through the strainer again
ohhh yes ohhh now I must say I'm on purpose okay that
was a bit more mess than I was trying to make but when you see this being made in India
it's not the tidiest job it spills over the cups they've got bulk production going on
so I wanted to make it as authentic as I could and look at that our little cups of masala
chai
now it's definitely not as dark as you see
it on the streets in India and also on the streets definitely in Kolkata you get this
in a beautiful clay pot which they make out of clay from the River Ganges and they say
it gives it a very unique special taste obviously we do not have clay from the River Ganges
just hanging out in the kitchen so we're just using little glass glasses
cheers let's see how it is
it's really gingery like super spicy
it's delicious, it's nowhere near as strong
as the chai that you find in India so I reckon we could have added heaps more tea leaves
yea but I think also our heat issue was a problem there we couldn't get quite enough
heat to really get the flavour out of the tea and probably the tea we used as well might
have been a much lighter flavour but it's not bad
not as strong as India, very strong in ginger, the cardamom is a very strong flavour too
maybe not quite as creamy yea I reckon more milk umm yea just more milk yea because it
did froth over quite a bit yea wow that was fun
that was a cool experience to do at home and I think doing it outside pulling it like that
making it pretty authentic in the style of how we were able make it that is a super fun
street food recipe to take to the home kitchen or the driveway kitchen
backyard kitchen cheers, there's gonna be heaps more of these street food recreations
so stay tuned cheers