Oregon Chai: A Review

As everyone knows, I am coffee crazy! But when it comes to tea, I am a bit pickier. I like two types of tea: Chai tea, and Milo’s brand iced tea. That’s about it. I am obsessed with Milo’s and I drink it daily, but give me sweet tea in a restaurant and I probably won’t drink it. Honestly, I need to do a review on Milo’s some time.

As far as hot tea goes, I only drink Chai tea hot, and then preferably as a latte. As often as I my tastes change, I also want to put out a disclaimer that I could be wild about some new tea next week, but this far, my tea tastes have been pretty narrow. I judge a coffee shop by two drinks: their americano, and their chai latte. If I get a “Dirty Chai,” which is a chai latte with espresso, I can judge their coffee and chai at the same time. I know I probably sound like a nightmare human being right now, but it’s a seriously good drink if it’s made right!

Since I don’t go to coffee shops as much anymore, I decided I want to try and make more of my favorites at home. I love Big Train brand powder chai tea mix, but I recently stumbled upon something called Oregon Chai tea concentrate in stores and I decided to give it a try. They had a sugar free version so I thought I would start there.

The directions couldn’t be any easier- add milk to an equal amount of tea concentrate, and then pour it over ice or microwave it, depending on if you want a hot or cold chai latte.

At first, I tired it hot using vanilla almond milk. It was really good and it didn’t need any additional sweetener at all. My only complaint was that I like it much spicier. They do have an extra spicy version though that I am going tot try and track down!

I also tried it iced and that was delicious as well. I honestly don’t have a preference on hot or cold, that kind of just depends on the day, but I really enjoyed the flavor of this both ways. Enjoying the flavor of chai is a big deal. I have used chai syrups that taste like soap, so I learned a good chai is hard to find!

I also discovered that I like it better when I don’t dilute it quite as much. Instead of using equal parts tea and milk, I add 2 parts milk to 3 parts tea. If you decide to try it, you’ll probably have to experiment with it to find your own perfect blend.

As I stated above, this could stand to be a fair bit spicier for my taste, so on that note, I have to say that it isn’t the best chai I’ve ever had by any means, but it’s still quite good. I do plan to buy more of this in the near future.

Also, I didn’t really do much experimenting with it. I did find their official Instagram and it had a treasure trove of intriguing recipes that I want to try. I also want to see how it holds up to being used for a Dirty Chai latte.

Rest assured that I will be trying all kinds of new things with my next carton of this. I’m on a roll with chai so I’ll probably be putting out plenty of chai recipes in the future!