Cha Yen Recipes

THAI ICED TEA (CHA YEN)

Steps:

• Bring water to a boil in a small saucepan. Remove from heat and add black tea; let steep about 10 minutes or to desired strength.
• Strain tea into a container and discard leaves. Add sugar and evaporated milk; stir until sugar is dissolved.
• Fill 2 glasses with ice. Pour tea over ice. Top each glass with 1 1/2 teaspoon milk.

CHA YEN (THAI ICED TEA)

Steps:

• Add 4 cups water to a medium saucepan. Cover with a lid and bring to a boil. Remove from the heat. Add rooibos tea, black tea, sugar, star anise and cloves; cover and let steep, 10 minutes. Strain tea, pressing on tea leaves and spices to extract as much liquid as possible, then discarding solids. Refrigerate tea until chilled, at least 1 hour.
• In a measuring glass, stir together the half-and-half, condensed milk and vanilla extract.
• Fill a pint glass with ice. Add 3/4 cup tea mixture and top with about 2½ tablespoons condensed milk mixture. Serve immediately.

THAI ICED TEA RECIPE (CHA YEN) - AUTHENTIC THAI STREET FOOD STYLE!

Steps:

• First step is to boil water, I'm just using a pot, but you could use a water boiler or microwave
• Take your tea sock and add about 1 tablespoon of black Thai tea. It's then easiest to put your tea sock into a bowl or big cup in order to steep the tea.
• Pour 1 cup of boiling water into the tea sock, and push it in and out to steep the tea and extract all that flavr. Steep the tea for a few minutes until it turns nice and dark in color.
• Taking a new cup, pour in 1 glass of hot tea
• Add 2 teaspoons of sugar, 2 teaspoons of sweetened condensed milk, and give it a nice stir
• Then add 2 teaspoons of evaporated milk, and continue to stir the tea until everything is fully mixed in
• Optional - A good Thai iced tea should have a little froth or some bubbles on top, so take 2 pitchers, and pour the tea from one to the other, with a bit of elevation. You could do this in a different way too, but it's pretty fun!
• Take a cup and fill it all the way to the top with crushed ice
• Gentry pour your hot tea mixture over the cup of ice
• To give your Thai iced tea a final creamy touch, drizzle on some more evaporated milk onto the top of your cup
• Add a straw, and you're ready to start slurping it down!

CHA GIO VIETNAMESE EGG ROLLS

Steps:

• Soak vermicelli and shiitake mushroom in warm water until pliable, about 15 minutes; drain well. Mince shiitake.
• Combine vermicelli, shiitake, pork, shrimp, carrot, shallot, fish sauce, sugar, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Toss well to break up pork and and evenly distribute filling ingredients.
• Lay 1 egg roll wrapper diagonally on a flat surface. Spread a scant 2 tablespoons of filling across the center of the wrapper. Fold bottom corner over filling, then fold in side corners to enclose filling. Brush egg on top corner of wrapper and continue rolling to seal. Make additional egg rolls in same manner.
• Heat oil in a deep-fryer, wok, or large saucepan to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C), or until a drop of water jumps on the surface.
• Fry egg rolls until golden brown, 5 to 8 minutes. Drain on paper towels or paper bags.

CHA YEN

Steps:

• In a medium saucepan, bring the water to a rolling boil, and place a heatproof 1-quart pitcher in the sink. When the water boils, add the tea and remove the pan from the heat. The tea will float to the top until you stir gently to coax it into the water. When all of the tea leaves are wet, let it steep for 3 minutes.
• Pour the contents of the saucepan into the pitcher, and don't worry if the dregs are left behind. Pour the tea back and forth between the pitcher and the saucepan 7 times as it becomes darker and stronger, ending up with the tea in the saucepan. Rinse out the pitcher and strain the tea through a coffee filter back into the pitcher. Add the syrup and stir to dissolve. Cool to room temperature, cover and chill until serving time.
• To serve, fill tall glasses with crushed iced. Add 3/4 cup of the chilled Thai tea per glass. Top off each glass with 3 to 4 tablespoons evaporated milk. Serve as the milk cascades over the ice and swirls into the tea.
• Combine the sugar and water in a small saucepan and bring to a rolling boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to maintain an active simmer and cook until liquid has thickened and colored slightly, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.
• Pour the cooled syrup into a jar with a tight-fitting lid, cover, and store at room temperature for 1 week, or in the refrigerator for several weeks.

LE YELLOW SUB (CHA-GIO)

Steps:

• For the dipping sauce: Combine the hot water, fish sauce and sugar in a bowl and mix until dissolved. Let it cool, then add the vinegar, calamansi juice, garlic and chile peppers. Taste test and adjust the dipping sauce to your liking. (You can prepare the sauce in advance. Extra sauce can be stored in the fridge for up three months.)
• For the cha-gio: Boil the mushrooms in water for 2 minutes, then drain. Chop 1/2-inch large and set aside.
• Submerge glass noodles in a large bowl of hot water. Let soften 10 minutes, then drain and cut into 1-inch lengths.
• In wok or medium deep pot (no oil, ground pork has plenty of pork fat), combine
• ground pork, taro root and wood-ear mushroom. Cook, mixing on low heat until pork and taro are well done. Turn off heat, then combine with carrots, cabbage, glass noodles, onions, fish sauce, sugar and pepper.
• Separate wrappers into individual sheets by pulling them apart slowly to prevent tearing. There will be one side of the sheet with a hard edge (the side that connects all wrappers together). Tear or cut off that hard edge so that all sides are the same thickness.
• Use about 1 full tablespoon filling for each roll, and fold top over, then the right side, then left, and fold down to end. Dab a little egg to seal the roll. Repeat with remaining filling and wrappers.
• In a wok or deep skillet, heat vegetable oil to 325 degrees F.
• Fry in small batches until rolls are golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer rolls to a tray lined with paper towels to drain off excess oil. Serve fresh and hot.

CHA YEN - COLD THAI TEA

Steps:

• Add sugar and sweet condensed milk together in a cup.
• Place a tea sock or cheese cloth directly above the glass with the sugar mixture in it.
• Add the tea to the top of the sock or cheese cloth.
• Pour hot water over the tea.
• Set the tea sock aside.
• Stir until the sugar and sweet condensed milk are dissolved.
• Add ice and top the tea with milk. (Reduce sugar and condensed milk by half if you want to drink it hot.).