Lynn Strong

I originally came up with this chai recipe in 2019, for the last all-together role-playing session my friends and I had before one of us moved to Chicago.

(And if anyone is wondering, the character I played, whom Asharan is built from, is a D&D 5e glamour bard. 😀 That’s how I’m keeping myself honest with spell power levels, and not having level 12-ish glamour bard Ashar pull off magical tricks that would be more in scale for the level 18-ish Archmage I hope folks will meet in the sequel!)

The modern version that’s published in Wyngraf came first, and then because I am just that much of a nerd, I took my medieval spice collection from the SCA and reconstructed the way it might have been written in a cookbook from this world, complete with Arabic measurements.

Here’s the medieval fantasy edition, lightly edited to suit Asharan’s world rather than our role-playing game.

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A masala-chai scented with roses

Begin always with the spices whole; for while this could be done with a bit of magery in company, our company are soon to be somewhat parted, and I fear my wishcraft cannot enchant a taste of memory from half the realm away. 

So instead, begin with the spices whole, chosen by hand of a trader you trust, and share first a cup of that trader’s family’s chai, to have also the tale of whence it came and of the family’s health; in order that the life-spark be conveyed with the spices, in a bond rooted in the earth in which it grew, through the lives of those who live by trading it from hand to hand along the spice-roads, unto those who partake of it in camaraderie, because chai is best to be taken among a company such as ours.

In a pot of five ratl or more, take two ratl of cream and another two of clean water if you can have it, or if not three ratl of the milk entire, and set it to a gentle fire lest it burn; or if your company have need of haste, set a fiercer flame and a friend to the stirring that it not scorch.

For that pot take from your spice-store a dirham of black peppercorns, cinnamon of the size of your small-finger, half a dirham of green cardamom pods, and the same of idrifil-i-sagir, which I believe you name grains of paradise for reasons which elude me entirely, and about which I must enquire of his Highness on some future occasion; it seems this definition of ‘paradise’ differs in some dramatic measure from my own. 

Take an uqiyya also of ginger-root and galengal together, fresh if you have them, or sugar-preserved if not. Grate in a nutmeg until the scent please you, and perhaps a few dried cloves, but no more than a few, because of the strength of it. 

Take an uqiyya or two of camellia-leaves, a cupped-palm, dried brown for the trade-travel, and at the end sweeten to your pleasure with a knob of gur if you yet walk the spice-roads, or perhaps honey instead if you are settled in a land of greenery. 

Simmer it for so long as you can bear to leave it un-tasted, at least a candlemark unless your company finds some need of haste. (I once thought there always to be time to linger over chai, but I have since encountered owlbears.)

Ladle the chai through a mesh into a beautiful pot, and sprinkle in a few drops of rosewater to scent it. Save the spices for a second infusion if it be desired. 

And at the last, if you live in the green-realms and have nearby a jasmine or a rose of the old families, gather the petals yourself and scatter them atop the cups you serve. If they were dried instead, add them earlier that they may infuse, but a fresh petal atop a cup of chai is not to be cooked limp and then presented to honored guests. Instead, make of it an art: a joy to behold as well as to taste.