Experimenting on myself...

Chai Latte-esque heh Lately, I’ve been drinking some chai latte drinks. (For those who need a translation, “chai” is just the latest faddish way to say “tea”—yeh, I know all the linguistic gobbledegook. It’s still just a faddish way to say “tea”). And “latte” is the la-di-da way to say “milk”. But the chai lattee drinks I’ve been introduced to by Lovely Daughter are a tad more complex than the old milk-in-tea (or cream-in-tea) I used to drink. Kind of a “la-di-da” version of my mom’s old spiced tea recipe with a few twists. But the mixes and pre-mixed liquids all seemed just a little too “not me,” if you will . So, I’m sipping my first effort at approximating a chai latte drink from scratch. Ingredients 6 individual serving bags of green tea 12 cloves of, well, cloves 6 cardamom pods 1 stick of cinnamon, ground finely (about a tablespoon or a little less) milk honey water (12 “coffee cups” or 12X 6-oz~ Just 2 quarts and an 8-oz measuring cup) Doing the deed Opened the bags and dumped the tea into the filter basket of our drip coffee maker. Added the ground cinnamon on top. Crushed the cardamom pods to release the seeds; crushed the cloves. Tied (well, stapled) the cloves and cardamom in some of the emptied paper tea bags and dropped them into my coffee carafe. Brewed as for coffee. When the brewing was done, I let the cardamom/clove bags steep a bit (5 minutes?) and removed them. Nuked about 4-oz of milk in a mug for 30 seconds Added a tablespoonful of coffee creamer (I like the texture of CoffeeMate, and its no-fat version is as smooth as the regular, so… ) Topped off with spiced tea from the carafe, sweetened to tste with honey. Not bad. Needs something citrus, though.  Maybe dried lemon peel or dried orange peel. Maybe a tad more or less on the spices. It’ll be fun experimenting. As it is, though, good enough for a warmer-upper on a fall day/evening. It’s not coffee, but it’s… nice. Update: Second cup tried no milk, just creamer. Hmmm, a tad better. Maybe I should try it with cream sometime. Still needs some dried lemon or orange peel, I think. Update #2: Oops. Forgot. Added just a pinch of nutmeg to the top of the tea leaves before brewing. Nutmeg just seems to enhance the high notes the cardamom adds.