Chai Tea

I stopped at the Cuban bakery after work today for a coconut cupcake.
I also bought a mojito cookie, and a guava pastry for my friend Deb.
And a couple homemade dog biscuits for her dogs.

I stopped at her house to see her new Lab puppy
(about the cutest little girl on the planet), and we ate our goodies with Deb's homemade Chai tea.
This tea is so fragrant, so yummy...even fancy coffees can't compare.

Here's the recipe:

Note, Deb makes hers in a little tea pot with a strainer at the top to hold the spices.
She uses only organic.
If you don't have a similar tea pot, just tie up the spices in a bouquet (or sachet...whatever the word is. Meaning put them in cheesecloth and tie them with a string. After steeping, you can remove the spice bundle, but you can actually get a couple more batches out of it if you'd like)

2 Black Tea bags
1 whole cinnamon stick
6 cardamom pods
several slices (use a vegetable peeler) fresh ginger
6 to 8 whole cloves
In three cups of water, boil spices for several minutes.
Remove bouquet, and pour tea into mugs
Serve hot with added milk or cream,
and sweeten with agave syrup or honey

This tastes even better the next day, when the flavors meld.

Out of curiosity, I looked up other recipes.
Some recipes add pepper, fennel, and/or anise.
Several here
and here
This one uses Darjeeling
Several more variations are available online--try different spices to see what you like best

It's interesting that "cardamon" and "cardamom" are both considered correct spellings.