June 11, 2024 Drinks

Best Ever Iced Chai

This is literally THE best ever iced chai from scratch as a perfect summer drink to cool you down. We infuse the preferred milk in our tea leaves and different spices for a perfect iced milky sweet chai. So, if you’re looking for a Chai masala recipe for summer, you are in the right place!

This is perfect for those days where you need a caffeine hit or just a cold drink, but don’t want to indulge in coffee or a hot chai. This recipe, in contrast to my other iced chai latte recipe, uses a different method where we infuse our preferred milk with our tea and spices, allow it to cool and finish it off with some syrup of choice.

If you are looking to pair this iced chai with an Indian snack, then my spinach paneer pakoras are an excellent choice, or alternatively, my Bengali aubergine fry.

Step-by-step guide on how to make an iced-chai

Slightly crush two cardamom pods together in your moratar and pestle and then put this to the side. Separately, grind together black pepper corns, cloves and saffron. Smash up your ginger.

Add one cup of your preferred milk to a stainless-steel sauce pan and add all of your spices (including bayleaf and cinnamon) and ginger.

milk infused with all spices and bayleaf

Stir occasionally and wait for the milk to come to a soft simmer. Note that if you added saffron, it will release a faint yellow colour, but this it totally normal and ok!

Add in two teaspoons of your Assam loose-leaf tea and let that heat up together until the tea colour reaches your desired strength. For me, the perfect colour is a caramel brown.

Turn the chai up to a very high heat, allow it to bubble almost to the top and then lower it all the way down. Do this method twice, this strengthens the flavours and the tea.

Strain your chai out into a separate bowl and press down the Siv down with a spoon to ensure all of the liquid is extracted. Let the chai cool down for around 10 minutes or so.

To a cup, add a few ice cubes (more if your chai is somewhat still warm), add in your syrup (I used agave) and pour in your chai. Give that a mix and enjoy!

Note:

If you don’t have loose leaf tea, tea bags will do just fine too!
If you do have it, please add the saffron as it elevates the chai so much!

Is there another way to make iced chai?

Yes, there is, but truly, I think this is the best method to make it. You can see the two methods outlined below, the second one is an iced chai latte, whereas this is an ‘iced chai’. The latter adds milk to a chai brewed in water whereas this recipe brews the chai in milk and it changes the entire drink. If I had to choose between these two recipes, I’d pick this one.

Number one: This method brews the tea in the milk first, a very traditional method already used to make hot chai and honestly, this method makes the chai that much creamier and silkier. In my opinion this is probably one of the top recipes for chai and iced chai.

Number two: This method is simply creating your chai from scratch in water, allowing it to cool down (but not for too long, as allowing it to sit for a long time will result in watered down flavours), and adding your ice, milk and syrup. Check out my iced chai latte post, where I make this version of an iced chai.

If you want something hot instead, head over to my karak chai recipe.

Iced chai ingredients

One cup and a half of your preferred milk.
Two black tea bags or loose-leaf tea.
Two cloves of cardamom.
Half of a bark of cinnamon.
Two cloves.
One bayleaf.
Two whole black pepper corns.
A few strands of saffron.
A peel of ginger.
Ice.

Bayleaf, cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, peppercorns, ginger

FAQ’s

Does the iced chai have caffeine?

Yes, it does. If you’re worried about your caffeine intake though, you could easily adjust this recipe to use non-caffeinated tea bags.

Best sweeteners to use for iced chai?

Agave
Maple Syrup
Simple Syrup
Honey (in order for the honey to dissolve though, you would need to add the honey into the chai mixture while it’s in the pan. Honey doesn’t really dissolve well in cold drinks)

Best milk to use in this recipe?

Oat milk works great in this recipe. I would stick to milks that make a good brew like oat and soy because you’re using this as the base for your chai.

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