Roni Mazumdar, owner of The MasalaWala restaurant in the Lower East Side, agrees. He aims to replicate that homemade taste for every item prepared in his restaurant’s kitchen. This includes the masala chai, made in fresh batches to order by Roni’s father Satyen, who introduces himself to diners as Mr. MasalaWala.

The taste of home in each cup led Tasting Table to declare The MasalaWala’s chai the best in New York. We paid a visit to see what makes the chai so special and to witness Mr. MasalaWala at work.

Mr. MasalaWala uses a 1:1 ratio of milk and water, adds black peppercorns, cloves, cinnamon, cardamom, and fresh ginger. He puts in a few heaping spoons of sugar for each cup. “This is the authentic way it is served in India. We add sugar unless customers specifically ask not to have it,” says Roni Mazumdar.

After bringing the mixture to a boil that nearly bubbles over three times, Mr. MasalaWala adds tea leaves sourced from India. He lets it simmer for a few minutes then strains the chai through a cloth, using a technique inspired by the chai wallahs of his native Kolkata.

It’s a lengthy process, but the taste is worth it. “It slows the kitchen down,” says Mazumdar. “Efficiency wise, this is the wrong choice.” But quality wise it is the best choice we have ever made and we will not serve anything less.”

We drink our chai and eat freshly fried pakoras and samosas dusted with chaat masala. We can taste the authenticity in each sip and bite.

“The flavors we want to bring in are from the streets of India,” says Mazumdar. “This restaurant is a tribute to all the walas in South Asia.”

The post A Tribute to the Wallahs appeared first on Chai Wallahs of India.

Under the 7 train

Tinny Bollywood music drifted out of a roadside chaat shop and the smell of samosas frying filled the hot, sticky air. We bumped into a six-foot sardar pitching palm reading services. The only future we were interested in at the moment was where we were going to find the best chai in the neighborhood. Without hesitation, he directed us to Al Naimat Restaurant & Sweets at the corner of 74^th St and 37^th Ave. Twirling his wiry white mustache, he promised their chai was “Sab se acchi.” He was right. Al Naimat’s chai was incredibly tasty. While standard masala chai was on the menu, we opted for a cup of Kashmiri chai. Light pink, delicately spiced and topped with crushed pistachios and almonds, the taste was closer to a rose-infused milk sweet than the gingery brew more commonly found at chai stands around India. It went perfectly with the mithai we snacked on – rich pista barfi and super sweet gulab jamun.

Kashmiri chai

Eager to discover what exactly made the chai so delicious, we chatted up Rusha, who was running the sweets counter. She was perfectly happy to talk about the restaurant, her family in Pakistan, and life in Queens. But she couldn’t let us in on the secret recipe – the chai wallah had left for the day, and he was the only one who knew exactly how it was made. Rusha did, however, reveal the surprising ingredient behind Kashmiri chai’s pink color: a dash of baking soda. She invited us to come back to meet the chai wallah and learn his special recipe.

We wish we could return to Al Naimat. Alas, we have packed our bags and are heading to India in just a few days. Inshallah, we will come across many variations on Al Naimat’s Kashmiri chai during our travels – perhaps we’ll even get the chance to whip up a pot with chai wallahs in Srinagar. For those of you who can’t make the flight to Kashmir, there’s always the 7 train to Jackson Heights.

The post The Taste of Kashmir in Queens appeared first on Chai Wallahs of India.

Constantly cleaning the apartment to secure that elusive responsible, clean and sane subletter? Check.

Nonstop studying of YouTube tutorials, DSLRs for Dummies books and dpreview.com comments to learn how to take stunning photographs of the chai wallahs we meet? Check.

Scrambling to stay on top of our website, Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, Instagram, and WordPress accounts – and accidentally deleting essential HTML code along the way? Check and check.

Amidst the madness, we carved out time to meet some key players in the Indian diaspora – the Chai Wallahs of New York City.

First stop on our list was Punjabi Grocery & Deli. A “pure veg” takeout spot popular with taxi drivers, health conscious yogis and cash-strapped college students, this hole-in-the-wall is the East Village’s answer to the roadside dhabas found throughout India. It’s one of our favorite places for a delicious, cheap Indian meal, and a go-to spot to grab a cup of chai. We dropped by to investigate how this downtown dhaba crafts their brew and to meet the chai wallah behind the cups.

Surinder Singh brews a cup at Punjabi Grocery & Deli

Surinder Singh, the gregarious Sikh manning the counter, was all too happy to speak with us about our project and his chai. In between customers, we chatted in Hinglish and learned that instead of having one chai wallah around to specialize in making tea, all deli employees are well versed in using the espresso machine to steam milk. To this, they add a bag of plain black tea, several cardamom pods, a sliver of ginger, and two heaping spoonfuls of sugar.

Gotta go for the double teabags.

“It’s not the traditional Indian way of making chai,” Surinder acknowledged. “In India, there are also machines. But there you mostly find it is the big pot.”

Cheers to finding the best big pot.

Chai at our favorite downtown dhaba.

The post Downtown Dhaba Chai appeared first on Chai Wallahs of India.