Teh Tarik (Delicious Frothy, Milky Tea)

What is Teh Tarik Made of?

All you need is:

• black tea
• boiling water
• condensed milk
• optional evaporated milk

Most stall owners also have variations on the plain version. You could add ginger for teh halia (ginger tea), or you could add spices like cloves, cinnamon and cardamom for the south Asian masala tea.

I start every morning with this, or if I’m feeling lazy, a cheat’s version of this masala tea. I add a pinch of ground cardamom and some freshly grated ginger to a huge mug for a fab way to start my day.

It’s very easy to make at home. Just follow the recipe below and adjust the sweetness accordingly.

What Tea is used for Teh Tarik?

Basically, any strong black tea. When we were young, we used to get our tea from the “mamak” shops – Indian grocers, basically. They’d have all sorts of tea, and the most popular, if I recall was Boh Tea, grown in the Cameron Highlands, in Malaysia.

The Indian tea of choice was this tea that was called Ceylon tea. It was a deep orange colour, and had a strong, sharp flavour with a marked tannin presence. Very aromatic too. The only Ceylon tea in the UK that holds a candle to the ones in Singapore and Malaysia is from Kent Tea and Coffee; everything else is too insipid for this tea lover.

Whatever you can find is good as long as it’s strong. It has to be able to hold its own against the thick and sweet condensed milk.

However, there’s nothing to stop you from experimenting with using a wide selection of teas to suit your taste.

Nostalgic Drink

I grew up in a non drinking family, so tea was always, and still is, the drink of choice. Not unlike here in the UK, everyone goes “cup of tea?”.

My grandpa used to break a handful of Jacob’s plain crackers and drop them into his milky tea – teh tarik or not – letting them soak, then eating them with a spoon! Lol, sounds gross, doesn’t it?

And that’s exactly what my kids say when they find me indulging in this nostalgic exercise! Come on, it’s just like dunking your biscuits, except that these ones are getting a soak while they’re at it!

You don’t dunk your biscuits? 😯

Hawker Centres and Kopi Tiams

So hawker centres are a group of food and drink stalls selling all manner of cooked food and drinks. These can be indoors or outdoors.

In the old days (totally sound like my father-in-law), they were nothing fancy, just selling honest to goodness, real, local food. And that would include Malay, Chinese and Indian. If you were lucky enough, they would also have Nyonya and Eurasian fare.

Kopi Tiams are, basically, coffee shops. The word itself is a mish mash of 2 local languages.

• kopi = coffee in Malay
• tiam = food stall in Hokkien, a Chinese dialect

Now the reason I mention these, is because, that’s where you’ll find teh tarik, perhaps less so in kopi tiams, because they tend to be run by the Chinese.

Other Hot Drinks in Hawker Centres and Kopi Tiams

So besides teh tarik, you can find so many different types of tea and coffee in these places. They can be iced, with no sugar, with extra sugar, with just evaporated milk, and so on.

Here are some terms, in a combination of Hokkien and Malay, should you find yourself in a kopi tiam:

• Teh Halia – ginger tea
• Tarik Halia – ginger teh tarik
• Teh “O” – black tea
• Teh Pua Siow – warm tea
• Teh Peng – iced tea
• Teh C – tea made with only evaporated milk
• Teh Kosong – tea with no sugar (kosong means empty in Malay)
• Teh Pok = light tea
• Teh Kow = strong tea
• Teh Dapao = tea to take away
• Teh Tarik Kow Kow Peng Kurang Manis – very, very strong iced teh tarik but not as sweet (kurang manis means less sugar in Malay)

And a few more that I can’t remember or just plain don’t know!

Right then, let’s get brewing!