Afternoon Tea

Ever since living in Japan I've developed a liking to tea, especially black tea with cream or milk and a little bit of sugar.

I love walking through the tea aisle at the grocery store and looking at all the different combination of teas available.  I gravitate towards the fruity ones but my smarter side knows that those aren't real teas.  Tea is actually made from one plant, camellia sinensis or the tea plant.  The different types of teas depend on what you do to the leaves.  Green tea is basically the baby leaves plucked early and barely dried, hence the green.  Black tea is dried the most and sometimes even roasted which makes it black.  Most of those fruit teas I gravitate for don't have anything from the actual tea plant except for dried fruit and spices.

I've been experimenting with black tea and different spices.  Recently, I created an orange chai tea.  It has the smell of chai (almost pumpkin like) and sweet oranges.

Orange Chai Tea

equal parts of:

- loose leaf black tea

- anise seed

- cardamom seeds

- cinnamon

- nutmeg

- cloves

- peppercorn

- double the amount of orange peels

Combine all ingredients.  Add boiling water and let steep for 3 minutes.  You can add milk and sugar if you like but I enjoy mine just straight.

My next experiment will be an attempt at earl grey tea.