Weekend Edition: Chai Tea Versus Ice Cream

I was visiting my midwife two days ago and she shared a little pregnancy nutrition advice that absolutely blew my mind so I thought I’d better share it with you. Fair warning, I have not done my own research on this yet. I was asking if it was better (when I needed a special treat) to have black tea, chai, or decaf coffee. She said probably black tea or chai because of the health benefits that black tea have—poor coffee is delicious but doesn’t tout much in the way of benefits for your health.

But this was the really mind blowing part: she said at this point in my pregnancy, it would be better to have a small chai every day than to have ice cream once a week!

Apparently ice cream is particularly unhelpful in pregnancy, partly because of the high sugar, partly because of the lactose fat. She said they can always tell when a baby is born, if her mother ate too much ice cream because it makes the babies bulk up in an odd way.

Can you beat that? And here I learn it in the last third of my third pregnancy—go figure.

Now, I’ve never tried making my own chai before, to be honest it sounds a bit involved, but what better smell to fill your home on a cold November weekend, on the eve of our first real snow? Yes, I will be trying it this weekend.

If you’d like to try your own, here is someplace to get you started:

Ingredients:

1. one Tbsp fennel or anise seed

2. six green cardamom pods

3. 12 cloves

4. one cinnamon stick

5. 1/4" ginger root, sliced thin

6. 1/4 tsp black pepper corns

7. two bay leaves

8. seven cups water

9. two tbsp Darjeeling tea

10. six tbsp honey or brown sugar

11. one cup milk

Method:

1. Boil first eight ingredients five minutes, then steep ten minutes

2. Add black tea and bring to a boil

3. Simmer five minutes:

4. Add milk and honey

5. Stir and drink

Enjoy!!