Karak Chai Recipe

Karak Chai stands out as the finest Middle Eastern Karak tea, boasting an incredibly rich and creamy taste. Its golden-brown hue, combined with a delightful balance of sweetness, slight bitterness, and astringency, creates a flavor profile that tea enthusiasts crave.

I discovered this recipe at a renowned street café in downtown Dubai, celebrated for crafting the ideal cups of Karak tea. After perfecting and testing it in my kitchen, I can confidently say it captures the essence of that authentic experience.

This rich and creamy Karak Chai is a flavorful, milky tea that is incredibly popular in Dubai, where I spend my evenings savoring a strong cup of this delightful tea with my family. Since my husband is a big fan of Karak, I experimented and fine-tuned this recipe in my kitchen to replicate the delicious taste we love from our favorite cafes.

Reviving your energy with a small cup of this 5-minute chai recipe is truly enchanting. If you're already a fan, you probably know that this delightful chai is served in cafes, restaurants, and hotels throughout the Gulf region. If you're excited to try making it yourself, follow the steps carefully, and you'll enjoy the true flavor of authentic Karak tea.

I enjoy preparing a wide range of teas because my family is quite fond of them. In India and Pakistan, many people have a special affection for Masala chai, and during the winter months, they particularly relish the taste of Pink Kashmiri Chai. You can also try this herbal orange peel tea. I love making homemade cappuccino, which can be prepared in under 10 minutes without coffee machine.

What is Karak Chai?

If you are curious to know, what is Karak? It means strong, while chai means tea, so when you put them together, you get Karak Chai—a beloved strong milk tea enjoyed by many across the globe. It’s a delectable hot beverage drink prepared with the combination of milk, and black tea leaves. Additional ingredients are just to enhance the flavor of tea.

Tea or chai is an international hot drink that people make according to their taste but some taste dominates and karak chai is one of them.

Is Karak Chai Arab or Indian/Pakistani?

Karak chai has its roots in traditional Indian chai but has gained immense popularity across the Gulf nations, particularly in the Middle East. There is a common belief that it originated in Qatar. This beverage is essentially a variation of masala chai, enhanced with spices such as cardamom and saffron, which contribute to its unique flavor profile.

Karak Tea is popular in the Middle Eastern region and now extending its boundaries and people love to make it in India and Pakistan. Although these extensions adapt different variations in recipes some people make it with masala (spices) and some prefer to make it by infusing a strong flavor of cardamom.

It’s famous in the US and UK and my friends visiting Dubai were asking to have Karak Chai first. If you are sleepy or tired, then have it as an aromatic hot cup of Karak chai will make you awake and intact your agility in no time. This is my best practice for making Kadak tea.

Why This Recipe Works?

• It's simple, easy and almost take 5 minutes to make it ready.
• Minimal ingredients used in this recipe to get authentic flavor of Karak Tea.
• Spending long hours working on laptop screen can make me tired and lethargic and 1 cup of karak tea easily help to intact my vitality.
• It's a family drink! as everyone love to have it without any reason.
• Aroma of tea makes whole house fragrant that great to inhale a soothing vibes.
• Last but not the least, it's a minimal ingredients and easiest Karak chai recipe that you can ever make.
• The rich creamy and warm terra cotta color of this tea is sure to captivate you from the very first sip.

Karak Chai Ingredients

Milk + Evaporated Milk: The blend of fresh milk and evaporated milk creates an excellent pairing, effectively softening the strong taste of evaporated milk that some may find unappealing. While it's possible to mix evaporated milk with water for dilution, using fresh milk is highly recommended, as it enhances the tea's texture, resulting in a rich and creamy experience.

Black Tea: Used loose black tea powder with strong flavor.

Cardamom: Coarsely ground green cardamom is primarily used to impart a distinct cardamom flavor to tea. Alternatively, cardamom powder can serve as a substitute for the pods.

Sugar: It's optional! If you prefer, you can prepare it without any sugar.

Additives (Optional): Various spices, such as ginger and cinnamon, are commonly used to infuse milk, particularly in Indian Masala Chai. These spices can significantly alter the taste of Karak tea, so feel free to include them if you enjoy their flavors; otherwise, you can stick to the traditional ingredients for Karak tea. Similarly, saffron-infused Karak tea has gained popularity, and you can enhance the milk by adding saffron strands during the boiling process.

How To Make Karak Chai

In a pan, pour milk and coarsely ground cardamom, boil it for about 2 to 3 minutes and keep stirring during this process to make it foamy in texture.

Now add Black tea and keep stirring.

Add Sugar according to your flavor or skip it if you want to make it sugar free.

Keep stirring...

Now add evaporated milk and give it a good mix.

Finely strain it!

Pour in tea cups and enjoy!

Tips To Make Best Karak Chai

Karak tea has creamy and thick texture compared with regular tea. If you want to make extremely creamy tea then use evaporated milk with black tea.

I have tried this tea with these combinations:

• Boil evaporated milk with water, cardamom and black tea. It was creamy and good in texture but the aroma of evaporated milk was empowering that made me little off with this idea.
• Next, I tried this recipe and it was perfect in taste. Didn't feel heavy after having this.
• Another idea is to use the hot water, add evaporated milk in it and use the tea bag. This one is good to make while traveling as it's super easy and quick.

Many people ask, how long to boil milk. Only 2 to 3 minutes are enough to boil milk. Don't boil longer as we are not making dessert 🙂

Quality of black tea matters here. Use good quality loose black tea as it will give you best flavor.

Tea Serving Ideas

There are plenty of idea that makes your teatime special. I love to arrange some quick recipes for teatime.

Here are few options that you might like;

• Karachi biscuits,
• Egg mayo sandwich (5 minute recipe),
• club sandwiches,
• mini spring rolls,
• fried sandwiches,
• cheese samosa,
• potato gratin without cream,
• Falafel and Egyptian macarona bechamel.

Q & A

Karak chai often raises several common questions, and here are some concise responses to those queries.

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