Rainforest Chai No. 113

Throwback Thursday! One of my oldest teas, this is another “vacation” tea, back from March 2017 when I visited Portland. Now I’m planning a return trip for the Portland Tea Expo in summer of 2019 and figure I’d better start finishing off the teas I picked up the last time I was there! I got this one at Tea Chai Te, a gem of a tea shop (can’t wait to return there!), and it’s really more of a spicy hot chocolate than a tea, since the base is lovely, fluffy Guittard cocoa powder. The spices are whole spices though, rather than ground, so it can be steeped like a tea, if you want to prepare it that way, and I believe the last time I made it that way I did so. For this revisit, however, I just put a generous teaspoon directly into my milk frother with a cup of milk and let it steep directly into the vanilla almond milk as the cocoa powder was thoroughly mixed up and dissolved into the milk. Then I just strained out the spices with a strainer as I poured into the cup.

This would definitely be my preferred method of making this, since when I steeped it as a tea it was very spicy for my spice-wuss self, and then it was tricky finding the right ratios of milk and sweetener to add to the tea. Like this, it is very creamy, the vanilla almond milk already brings a balancing sweetness for all the spices, and I’m getting a lovely amount of spices shining through, so it tastes like a lovely cup of Mexican hot chocolate. The cardamom is especially strong, so fans of cardamom (and chocolate, of course!) would probably love this! I’m also getting notes of ginger, pepper, and a dusting of cinnamon across the top of the cup. Rich, creamy, warm, spicy, and satisfying! I’d definitely enjoy more of this! Increasing my rating slightly from before, since now that I have a milk frother to prepare this (I don’t think I even owned one a year ago?) it really makes a huge difference in how easy it is to make this “cocoa style” and how much that improves the overall flavor and mouthfeel for me.