After Tandoori Chicken & Momos, Time For a Cup of ‘Tandoor Chai’

The ‘tandoor chai’ is prepared using a tandoor and then poured into a hot mud cup.

Pune-based tea-seller serves ‘Tandoor Chai’.

(Photo: ANI Screengrab)

Video Editor: Ashutosh Bharadwaj

You have definitely tasted tandoori chicken, tandoori rotis and even tandoori momos. This Pune-based tea-seller serves 'Tandoor Chai'.

A tea shop named ‘Chai-La’ based in Kharadi, Pune, is run by two graduates. The owners claim this method of making ‘tandoor’ tea is the first of its kind.

“In this unique tea-making process, clay pots or kullhads are roasted in a pre-heated tandoor. Then semi-cooked tea is poured into the extremely hot kullhads to bubble over as it finishes cooking. The hot clay pot lends the chai its smoky flavour. Once done, the piping hot chai is served in another clean clay pot,” explains Amol Dilip, the co-owner of ‘Chai-La’.

It is a very unique concept and has a very unique taste. We have never tasted anything like this before. My office is close by and we keep flocking here everyday to have tea.

Ashish, Customer

Speaking to ANI, Pramod Bankar and Amol Dilip, the owners of Chai-La, said that the idea came to them from the unique way in which their grandmother served them milk in the village.

The teashop owners also added that the tandoor chai, as it is poured in mud cup, brings along the essence of village soil.

Only a month-old, this tea shop is in the news for the unique way of making chai.

This is a version of <i>kullhad chai</i> but tandoori chai tastes even better. The slight essence of clay makes it better. Boiling tea and cooking it are two different things. This tea is cooked and that’s the reason it’s so good and the taste is so different.

Anil Jha, Customer

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