Best Ever Vanilla Chai Powder Mix
This Vanilla Chai Powder Mix is the perfect little luxury to keep in your pantry for those mornings when you want something a bit more special than a plain cup of coffee. It’s got all those warm, cozy spices like ginger and cardamom that make it taste just like a fancy coffee shop treat, but for a fraction of the cost!
A Quick Look At The Recipe
- Recipe Name: Best Ever Vanilla Chai Powder Mix
- Serves: 4
- Main Ingredients: Non Fat Dry Milk Powder, Powdered Non Dairy Creamer, Sugar Free French Vanilla Powdered Non Dairy Creamer, Ideal Sweetener, Unsweetened Instant Tea, ground ginger, ground cinnamon, ground cloves
- Why You'll Love It: The great thing about this recipe is that I could easily make it sugar free (or significantly lower in sugar) and that is what I'm bringing you today. If you'd like Kelly's original recipe please click here to visit that and be sure and tell her I sent ya! I want to thank her for generously giving me permission to share her recipe with you today.
Better Than Your Local Coffee Shop
A few months back, I met a friend in a local coffee shop for a little chat, and when I got there, she had ordered me their Spiced Vanilla Chai. I had never had this stuff before, and one sip had me leaping over the moon – it was so good! I was really surprised that it wasn’t coffee because it has such body and depth of flavor. It was like a perfectly baked ginger cookie dipped into perfectly made coffee.
However, I don’t drink sugar for a multitude of reasons (hence my sugar-free Skinny Pumpkin Spice Latte), so when the lady behind the counter told me she couldn’t make it sugar-free, I was pretty disappointed. Good thing I don’t give up too easily! The great thing about this recipe is that I could easily make it sugar-free (or significantly lower in sugar), and that is what I’m bringing you today.
Reader Review
“Made this weekend, and sipping on a cup as we “speak”. DELICIOUS! I don’t need the sugar either, and this recipe is PERFECT. Plenty sweet and gives my local “5-Bucks” a run for their money! I will be packaging in a mason jar and including in my neighbor gift baskets this Christmas. Thanks!” – Kristen
Ingredients You’ll Need
- Powdered milk
- Sweetener
- Instant unsweetened tea
- Sugar-free French vanilla creamer
- Non-dairy coffee creamer
- Ginger
- Allspice
- Cloves
- Nutmeg
- White pepper
- Cinnamon
- Cardamom
Quick Tips for a Delicious Chai
- You can use regular sugar or Splenda in place of the Ideal Sweetener. I found Ideal at Kroger’s packaged under their own label, but with “Ideal” listed on the front.
- Make a big batch and store it in a pretty jar. It makes a great homemade gift for friends and family, especially during the holidays!
- If your mix clumps up over time, just give it a quick pulse in the food processor or break it up with a spoon before using.
- Try it with warm almond or oat milk for a dairy-free version. It’s just as delicious and super creamy!
- Start with less sweetener than you think you need. You can always add more to your cup, but you can’t take it out once it’s mixed in.
How to Make the Best Vanilla Chai Powder Mix
1. Add Ingredients to a Food Processor
Add all of your ingredients to a large food processor or blender.
If you prefer stronger flavors, use heaping measurements with your spices. I use heaping teaspoons, rather than teaspoons. If you prefer your flavors a little milder, use the exact measurements listed in the recipe.
Tip: If you don’t have a food processor, you can also use a blender, but you may need to make it in smaller batches to have room. Just put your tea, spices, and powdered milk in first and mix those up really well, then you can stir the rest in by hand.
2. Make the Vanilla Chai Mix
Next, put the lid on that puppy and turn it on. Allow the processor to run until the vanilla chai mix becomes a fine, even powder.
3. Make Your Vanilla Chai
To make your chai, simply add 2 heaping tablespoons of mix to 8 ounces of hot water or milk and stir. I personally love mine with hot water, but use whatever you prefer!
That’s it! Enjoy your cozy cup of vanilla chai!
How to Store
Just store this in an airtight container to keep it fresh. I like to put mine in little 8-ounce canning jars so I can have one or two to give away to friends.
In the mood for more traditional Southern sweets? How about some Old-Fashioned Frog Eye Salad? YUM! Now that we’ve done all that mental cooking, it’s time to sit down with a nice hot drink….
Best Ever Vanilla Chai Powder Mix FAQs
Vanilla chai is essentially spiced chai with added vanilla. Regular spiced chai focuses on bold warming spices like cardamom, ginger, cinnamon, and cloves. Vanilla chai uses those same spices and adds a smooth vanilla flavor that softens the blend, making it slightly sweeter and creamier. It’s the more mellow, dessert-like version of your classic spiced chai.
It depends! If you’re using black tea as your base, expect a moderate caffeine boost that’s similar to a regular cup of tea, but less than coffee. To keep caffeine levels low, swap in a decaf black tea or rooibos instead. Rooibos is naturally caffeine-free and pairs wonderfully with warm chai spices. Ultimately, you’re in control of how much caffeine ends up in your cup!
If you want to make more of this delicious tea, just double or triple the recipe! The ratios work out perfectly when scaled up. The only thing to keep in mind is that your food processor might get a little crowded, so you may want to blend in two separate batches to make sure everything mixes evenly.
If this vanilla chai mix made your morning a little more special, I’d love to know! Leave a rating and comment below.
Ingredients
- 1 cup non-fat dry milk powder
- 1 cup powdered non-dairy creamer I used Coffee Mate
- 1 cup sugar-free French vanilla powdered non-dairy creamer
- 2½ cups sweetener Splenda or sugar
- 1½ cups unsweetened instant tea or use decaf
- 2 tsp ground ginger
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp ground cloves
- 1 tsp cardamom
- 1 tsp nutmeg
- 1 tsp allspice
- ¼ tsp white pepper
Instructions
- Place all ingredients into a food processor or large blender. Blend until a fine powder forms. Store in an airtight container.
- To make Vanilla Chai, add 2-3 tablespoons of mix to 8 ounces of hot water or milk (I use hot water).
Notes
Nutrition
Christy you did it again! This is beyond delicious. I made it exactly by your recipe. It is PERFECT! I am so happy to have something truly sugar free and truly delicious to give to my diabetic friends. Thank you so much for this recipe.
Merry Christmas to you and yours.
P.S. My little food processor won’t hold all the ingredients at one time so I mixed everything in a bowl then processed it in small batches. I put the blended mix into another bowl and stirred it all together just to be sure the spices were dispersed properly. Worked like a charm.
I am so glad you liked it Sylvia!! I love the way you put it all together, great thinking and thank you so much for sharing so that others who may only have a small food processor can follow your lead!!
Just made it to take with me to work tonight. It is soooo delicious! Even though I did not add Cardamon(too expensive) and Allspice. I thought I had the allspice, but it turns out I didn’t. Next time I make this, because there will be a next time, I will add the extra spices. It’s still good even without them.
HI Christy, I asked on facebook if regular tea powdered up would work, you didn’t think so, because finding instant tea that isn’t sweet iced tea mix is difficult, I am not a fan favourite of sweet tea of anykind. However that isn’t why I am posting this time, try to find a store that sells middle eastern, or Indian foods and spices, cardamom is used in both foods, I get cardamom by the bag full, and all I have to do is take the dried shell off, although you can grind that up too, and grind the seeds, its a bit hard to do in a regular spice grinder, but if you have a mortar and pestle its simple, its much better fresh ground as it does loose its flavour in the jar. I grind some every year at Xmas for cookies etc, and use up the leftovers over the next few months, its super deluxe in blueberry pie, which isn’t real highbush blueberries but low growing berries a lot call huckleberries, although my mother said they weren’t real huckle berries, due to the shape, they are round like blueberries and the huckle berries are long, they have very close flavours so we just picked all of them and called them blueberries or huckleberries depending on which we had the most of!
Christi one of the nurses at the VA Clinic asked me if this would taste as good with the sugar free chocolate coffee creamer???? She loves it just the way it is but shes a chocoholic lol 🙂
Dear Christy,
My husband volunteers at the VA Clinic 3 days a week at Ft Rucker and at least once a week I try to make a treat of some kind for the Drs, Nurses and other staff that work there. I sent a quart jar of your Vanilla Chai Tea last week and it was such a big hit that they are asking for more, so I promised them a jar once a month 🙂 My husband also has cancer and goes to the Cancer Center in Enterprise daily for radiation treatments. This morning I left the staff there a quart jar of your Vanilla Chai also. All of these people not only work so hard but give so much of themselves, its amazing how appreciative they are for homemade treats like this that they dont have time to make for themselves. Thank YOU Christy for sharing your recipes with us 🙂 You make a bad day good for so many people and you dont even know it 🙂
How sweet of you Patti!! Thank you for sharing my Chai mix and your heart. I will be praying for you, your husband and his team of doctors, nurses and staff!! I hope that you have a blessed Thanksgiving!
Christi, my husband tells everyone that this Chai tastes like Christmas in your mouth. He has a huge mug of it everyday after he wakes up from his nap 🙂
Made this weekend, and sipping on a cup as we “speak”. DELICIOUS! I don’t need the sugar either, and this recipe is PERFECT. Plenty sweet and gives my local “5-Bucks” a run for their money! I will be packaging in a mason jar and including in my neighbor gift baskets this Christmas. Thanks Christy! 🙂
Thanks for posting this recipe, I gathered everything up and made it today. I made it without sugar so that I can share it with a friend of mine who is diabetic and can add her sweetener to it. I used only 2 tsp mix per 8 ounce cup of hot water and added 1 tsp of sugar and I like this. Thanks again for the wonderful recipe.