Solving crimes against chai

With public service redundancies looming under a change of government, now might be the time for Canberra's public servants to dream that brave dream and quit the public purse for a life doing what you love.

Anthea Cahill would be the first to warn this isn't for everyone, but she is also keen to encourage people to take the plunge if they have an idea and a helping of determination. She was in just that position five years ago when she set out to make chai on a very, very small scale. Now, she employs eight part-timers, is about to move to a "proper factory" in Queanbeyan, and has made a deal with Sydney-based coffee company Campos to see her chai in coffee shops around the country.

Cahill has just launched a new "barista chai", a dark and sticky version of her formula designed to streamline chai-making for busy coffee shops who don't have time for the usual method of simmering on the stove top to infuse the spices. The chai has honey already mixed in, and simplifies the time and care enormously.

Cahill hopes this will solve the travesty of insipid and badly made chai, a problem she encountered in on a research trip to Melbourne and Sydney, where she watched baristas make chai. She sat, she says, in hundreds of cafes observing what she calls their "crimes against chai" - too watery, too milky, and desperately short on flavour. The problem, she says, was threefold - using chai that is low on spice in the first place, the length of time chai takes to brew (she recommends five minutes on the stove top), and the passion of baristas for coffee, not chai. Her answer was to make it fast and easy.

We've tagged along to Cahill's home on the instigation of Michael Fawcett, a cherry grower from Young, whom we featured recently in an account of a relish-making competition he instigated. Fawcett is an ex-school principal. He's also a vegetarian, firmly in the camp of those who believe cow's milk is not healthy for humans, and a rather aesthetic eater overall. He avoids caffeine and alcohol (he has deep-vein thrombosis) and drinks his chai with soy milk. Such is Fawcett's dedication to chai that he has asked Cahill to show him how to brew it the right way.

After a chai at a recent visit to the Sydney Writers Festival, Fawcett returned convinced he must work out how to make it better at home. "I was happy as a pig in mud until I had this chai. It tasted magnificent," he says.

"I thought up until a little while ago that nobody on this planet made chai as good as me, then I went to this place and … I thought 'Michael, maybe you're not making it as good as you think.' "

Is it an issue of how long to steep it? Is it the amount of the milk? The temperature? They're questions that have been playing on Fawcett's mind, but in the event they're probably not as momentous as they have become for him. How you like your chai is not so different to how you like your tea - more milk or less, sweeter or not.

It's really a matter, Cahill says, of ensuring you give the spiced tea time to brew in hot water before you add the milk, since milk stifles the brewing.

At home, we drink Cahill's decaffeinated chai, made with roast chicory and roast dandelion instead of black tea, simply brewing it like weak black tea. But Cahill believes chai should be made with milk. She brews it on the stove top for five minutes in hot water then adds an equal amount of milk and stirs in honey. Her barista chai is pre-mixed, honey and all, so all the coffee shop needs to do is mix it through half a cup of boiling water, leave it for a minute to steep, then add milk and texture it in the coffee machine.

Cahill's chai contains cinnamon, ginger, cardamom and cloves, with black tea. She makes it at her father's home in Queanbeyan, but is about to move to new premises, where she will install packing machinery for the first time, and boost staff. The Campos deal is a game changer, she says, more than doubling production - a 150 per cent increase in volume is a conservative estimate. Fiance Wes Smith, who owns the Live Well, Natural Spa and Wellness Centre, is also helping with the business.

"It's like the culmination of all my goals for the last five years," Cahill says. "To get Real Chai out there to a broad market and be recognised as the best chai maker in Australia. So it's amazing to team up with people I believe are one of the best coffee companies in Australia. It's very, very satisfying to have taken it to that place."

In Canberra, the barista chai is used at Canberra cafes Farmers Daughter, Ona, Mocan and Green Grout, Two Before Ten, Elk and Pea and Dream Cuisine.

Five years ago, Cahill started by making chai for herself and friends. Then came her market stall, and from the start she made a profit. Since she was working in the public service, she re-invested the profits into the business. Eight months later, she quit her job and turned to chai full time. Now 35, she's thinking about starting a family. But alongside that, her chai plans are bubbling away. Next, she wants to head to Sri Lanka where her spices are grown in the hope of establishing direct links with the growers.

And she's setting up a blog for others who might have a dream of their own food business. In Canberra, many people are blessed with jobs in the public service, which offer the flexibility you need.

"For anyone with an idea that is simmering away I'd say take the plunge," she says. "You never know where it may lead. And you don't have to quit your job overnight. Start slow, start small and transition over when the time is right - it can be virtually risk free that way."

As for Michael Fawcett, back on his farm near Young, he has changed his formula since visiting Cahill, and now uses less soy milk in the mix, although this is more to do with doubts about drinking so much soy than what he learnt about making chai.

For more information, head to the RealChai website.