When I
finish answering a question with the phrase, “But I really don’t know why I
think that,” you probably shouldn’t believe my answer. I have a tendency to get false ideas stuck in
my head; ideas that I will foolishly act on. This is not a trait you want to
have when you cook; especially if you only have one chance to get it
right.
On Valentine’s Day this year, I
got two cards in the mail and one small manila envelope (and no flowers or
chocolate from my boyfriend). The first
card was from an always thoughtful mother of one of my friends back home. The second was from my mother, containing two
pieces of mail that were mistakenly sent to my home address (she also didn’t
include chocolate, or even three stick of bubble gum like she used to send me
in her letters when I was at camp). The
small manila envelope was from my sister, and it contained five tea bags, a Ziploc
bag full of cardamom, cloves, peppercorns, and cinnamon, and $2 labeled “milk
money.” It was everything I needed to
make the chi tea that my pocketbook forbade me making in my previous post.
I was excited to make the chi,
but the spices smelled so go, that I left then by my bed for a week. It was like falling asleep in India all over
again. Last night, knowing that Annie
and Tony are coming up on Saturday, I decided to make chi. With the limited number of spices Annie sent
me, I knew I only had one chance to get the chi right. Everything went smoothly until I had to add
the sweetened condensed milk. Like I
mentioned before, I have a tendency to make false assumptions, based on poor
logic. Normally when you cook and it
calls for ingredients found a can, you dump the whole can in. So I dumped the whole can of sweetened condensed
milk into the chi.
Initially, when I first tried
the chi, I was ecstatic. The blend of
spices in this recipe is the closest to what I tasted in India. However, half a cup later, the sugar was
overwhelming me, and I was struggling to finish my cup. I thought it was strange, since I had followed the recipe. Curious to when even my sweet tooth was on
overload, I rechecked the recipe and realized that I should have only put in half a can of sweetened condensed
milk.
So this afternoon, I am
going to bundle up, scrape the ceaseless Wyoming snow off my car and head out
to Wal-Mart to buy tea bags, and make this recipe again, minus the sweetened condensed
milk. Luckily, I have some spices left over.
Hopefully when I mix the unsweetened chi with the overly sweetened chi,
they will equal each other out. Tomorrow,
if Annie and Tony will be able to make it up over the I-80 pass (which always
seems to be closed in winter) or over the Hwy 287 pass (which should be closed
more during the winter), they will be able to enjoy a cup of chi that is
slightly less sweet.
*For recipe, go look at the previous post labeled "chi tea"
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