Guest Blog: CHAI! - Part 2

Dear reader,

Please give some love to my friend and guest blogger, herbalist and yogi Dagmar Jones!

Born and raised in Germany, Dagmar has been a resident of Central Florida for more than 20 years, where she lives with her husband and two children on their organic orange grove.  Organic produce and herbs are her passion and she is fortunate enough to have made it her profession as well.  I invite you to meet her inspiring and energetic personality!

Here is Dagmar’s take on the ingredients of chai tea—from an herbalist’s perspective.

	Cardamom: The parts used of the cardamom plant for herbal actions are the seeds.  Seeds are obtained from commercial plants in Sri Lanka and India.  Cardamom is a very valuable culinary herb used extensively in India to relieve flatulent dyspepsia and griping pains.  If chewed before a meal, cardamom will stimulate the appetite and the flow of saliva.
	Ginger: The ginger rootstock is dug up when the leaves have dried.  (As a side note, it is very easy to grow your own ginger.  When you purchase ginger from the grocery store and notice a small shoot appearing, set the ginger into a pot of soil and water gently every day.  The shoots will grow into leaves and the root will multiply underneath the soil.  There is nothing like fresh ginger!).  The remains from the stem and root fibers should be removed.  Wash thoroughly and dry in the sun.  Ginger is a wonderful herb for the stimulation of the peripheral circulation.  During fevers, ginger acts as a useful diaphoretic, promoting perspiration.   As a carminative, it promotes gastric secretion and is used in dyspepsia, flatulence and colic.
	Cinnamon: The dried inner bark of the cinnamon shoots are used to make what we know as cinnamon sticks or cinnamon powder.  Cinnamon is a strong carminative.  It relieves nausea and vomiting.  Because of its mild astringency, it can be used to relieve diarrhea as well.  Cinnamon is known to balance blood sugar levels in the body.
	Cloves: The parts used for herbal action are the unexpanded flower buds.  Cloves increase circulation, promote digestion and nutrition, raise the body temperature and stimulate the excretory organs.  It also stimulates and disinfects the kidneys, skin, liver, and bronchial mucous membrane.  It is the most powerful of the aromatic and carminative herbs.  Cloves are also indicated for cold extremities, colic, flatulence and indigestion.

Chai tea contains a lot less caffeine than coffee, so it is a great alternative for people who enjoy stimulants throughout their day.  The Black tea that is used to make chai has antioxidant properties.  The spices or culinary herbs used in chai tea are all digestive aids, as Ayurvedic medicine (the ancient Indian medical system where chai tea originated) maintains that a healthy digestion is the key to overall health and well-being.  Ayurveda speaks of the digestive fire ("agni") which should be burning all day long to aid digestion and proper absorption of nutrients.  For that reason, Ayurveda frowns on cold and iced drinks as the cold is said to put out agni.  Chai tea aids in the digestive fire being strong all day and is a great beverage upon rising to prepare the body for the assimilation of nutrients as well as after meals to combat flatulence, balance and support digestion of the body.

Read more about Dagmar the herbalist and yoga instructor, as well as her Greener Living Co-op , and organic veggie and fruit delivery service.

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CHAI!

Yoga class this morning held a special treat—a fellow yogi who regularly “ommm”s loudly in the most dissonant interval.  I’m always glad to see her because I know she will bring a big smile to my face at the end of class.  Namaste!

Now it’s time for—yes, finally—a CHAI!

My search for the perfect recipe to cook up a chai from scratch is over.  For the last week my kitchen was transformed into a test lab and I did not even shy away from endangering my health to find that perfect mix.  While I enjoy spicy food (well, to a certain degree that is), it turned out that I seem to be more simple natured when it comes to chai.  Even after an extensive test phase, I ended liking the recipe I started out with the best.

[insert drumroll]

My #1 chai recipe—slightly adapted from Chai & Yoga’s blog website:

Ingredients:
2 cups of water
3 green cardamom pods
1 tsp black tea (I use loose Taj Mahal’s Orange Pekoe tea)
1 tbsp fresh ginger
2 cups nonfat or 2% milk

Instructions:
Crush cardamom and ginger with a pestle and mortar. (If you don’t have one, open the cardamom pods with your fingers and smash the ginger with the back of a knife.) Bring water, cardamom and ginger to a boil.
When the water starts to simmer add the tea and stir, then add the milk. Bring to a boil again, watching the pot carefully.  Simmer for about 3 minutes or until the color looks satisfactory, depending on how strong you like your chai.  I find the Taj Mahal tea to be very strong, so I reduced the original amount of tea from 3tsp to 1 tsp.  You may want to use more than 1 tsp, depending on your tea and preference.
Pick out big pieces of ginger with a spoon, then strain the chai into cups.  Enjoy sweetened or just like this, the latter is my personal preference.

The preparation alone is a pleasure for the senses.  Crushed cardamom pods, fresh ginger…mmhhhh!  I find I’m craving ginger even in food now.  Maybe I should get myself analyzed by an Ayurvedic practitioner one of these days.

At day 1 of the test phase, my friend Sabine from Santa Cruz stopped by and I offered her a taste of my #1 recipe.  She liked it and we exchanged ideas and recipes over the following days.  She sent me her favorite formula which, of course, I had to try.  Now, my dear reader, I mentioned that Sabine lives in Santa Cruz.  If this doesn’t mean anything to you, click here to see a typical citizen of Santa Cruz.  These people are hardcore in any way nature intended!  I noticed at first glance that Sabine’s recipe compared to mine had about twice the amount of spices, plus some additional ones with only half the amount of liquid, but hey—nothing would stop me from finding the perfect mix, right?!  I paid the price.  Big time.  The most awful heartburn haunted me for the rest of the day…  Have you ever been to a yoga class where the teacher asks you to go just a little bit deeper into the pose and engage in just a little more ujjayi breathing to fuel the fire in your body?  If you want to feel said fire in your stomach and esophagus without stretching a single muscle, cook up a cup or two of Sabine’s chai recipe, which she says she got from Yogi Tea.  Now feel the fire!!

Real Masala Chai Latte

Ingredients:

- 1 1/2 cups of water

- 8 green cardamom pods

- 2 slices fresh ginger, peel

- 1 stick of cinnamon, 2 inches long

- 2 whole cloves

- 2/3 cups of whole milk or low fat

- 3 tsp of loose Assam Tea

- 2 Tbs of Agave Syrup

[Since Agave syrup is fallen from grace these days, Sabine suggests using honey instead.]

Instructions:

1) Crush the cardamom and cloves together until the cardamom pods open up.

2) Put the water and spices into a pot and bring to a boil.

3) Simmer for 5min.

4) Add the milk and Tea and bring mixture to almost boiling and turn off the heat.

5) Allow the brew to infuse the tea for about 2-3 min.

6) Strain the chai, add 1Tbs of sweetener to each cup, stir and enjoy!

No matter if lots of spices or only a small selection strike your taste buds, chai is always worth an inspiring and balancing break—especially if you’re in need of some inner fire. 

Go ahead, my friend, give it a try!

On a side note:  I have not had any coffee for the past week.  This is weird, since I’m usually a 'once to twice a day' coffee aficionada.  For some reason the desire to even open the coffee jar has plummeted to below zero these days.  Maybe next time I’ll try to add a piece of ginger…

Keep your eyes peeled for part 2 of our excursions into the world of chai—this time by guest blogger, herbalist and yogi Dagmar Jones.

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Holiday Cheer

(my parents' backyard in Germany these days)



Frohe Weihnachten & Merry Christmas, my friend!

It's Christmas Day. I'm sitting at the kitchen table typing, while my two daughters decorate gingerbreadmen. Actually, they are gingerbread-girls as I was forcefully informed. I'm itching to get out of the house. A nice hike would be awesome right now. In fact, I think that's what I'm going to do. Yay!

I received quite a few holiday-emails and cards in the past couple of days, also from friends and family in Europe. Thanks to all of you. While I'm glad I missed out on the long lines at the airport, canceled flights, and piles of snow to shovel, I sure wished I could share the white Christmas with you. Bay Area Christmas weather just never seems satisfactory if you grew up in need of Gluehwein to keep your core temperature somwhere close to 37⁰ Celsius at this time of year (if you're not sure what I'm referring to, check out the previous post). In fact, I moved here in December, 11 years ago. The weather had been lousy in Germany at that time, and I arrived at SFO with an awful cold and wrapped up in layers and layers of clothes. The first day, I took my then 2-years-old son to the playground where children played barefeet--yes, BAREFEET!!--in the sand. Talk about culture shock!

No, let's just talk about culture for now, without the shock. Yesterday I made Brataepfel (baked apples), like I always do on Christmas Eve, because that's what my mom does on Christmas Eve and probably my two sisters do as well. It's almost like a pandemic of Brataepfel cooking. One of my daughters commented last night "Mama, hier riecht es nach Weihnachten!" ("Mom, it smells like Christmas here.") Well, it looks like the next generation of Brataepfel cooks has arrived! See the picture below for my creation from yesterday. Just imagine them smothered in a pile of whipped cream. Mmmhhhhhhhhh!!

(Do you wonder how I managed to get the soft-edged, blurry-frame effect around this photo? I do, too. I awkwardly fumbled around with my camera, covering the lense with one sweaty palm--next thing I know is the photo turned out like this...)

It even appears that I am getting used to blogging over the holidays. I was warned by more experienced bloggers, that it has addictive properties and "checking the blog" would become a first priority. Well, I don't know, I'm still figuring out the technical side of it. So many colorful buttons to press! I discovered one yesterday, that I think is very cool: the "stats" tab. Clicking on it will give me a list of the activitiy on the blog--hourly. The pressure is on, my friend, make that click to view this blog--it'll show!

Oh, and even better, it gives a list of countries the blog has been accessed from and shades those countries dark on a map of the world. Now that's were the fun really starts. The U.S. is in first place so far, followed by Germany, Czech Republic (Hi Kate, I hope you have an awesome, well-deserved vacation with your family!), and Malaysia. That's odd. I don't know anybody in Malaysia. Somebody traveling? I'd love to see photos!

So much for this Christmas Day post. I'm off to the outdoors! That's one reason to love Northern California for sure. I'm also feverishly experimenting with chai (see my first post in German for details, or simply know that I'm on the verge of discovering the most delicious recipe for chai from scratch). I'll share as soon as I found it. And I'm also seeing a guest post or two in the near future of this blog--inspired by the muses!

Have a beautiful day, filled with warm fuzzy thoughts,

Ute

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