Masala chai, mixed spice tea, is strong black tea simmered with milk, sugar and whole spices until it turns a rich, rusty caramel color. Tea was grown commercially in India from the nineteenth century, but drinking it widely at home took a promotional push in the early twentieth, after which the country made it thoroughly its own. Today the chaiwala, the tea seller with his stove, pan and tiny glasses, is found on every railway platform and street corner, and a cup is the punctuation mark of the Indian day.

Unlike tea brewed in a pot, chai is boiled, and boldly. The spices go in first to release their oils, then the tea, then the milk, and the whole thing rises to a rolling boil once or twice before being strained into cups. It is warming, fragrant, gently sweet and entirely non alcoholic, which makes it the drink for the whole room during a long race, from the first lap to the last.

The chai

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups (600 ml) water
• 1 inch (2.5 cm) fresh ginger
• 6 green cardamom pods
• 4 whole cloves
• 1 small cinnamon stick
• 4 black peppercorns
• 1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds
• 2 tablespoons loose Assam black tea
• 2 cups (480 ml) whole milk
• 3 to 4 tablespoons sugar

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