Tea Spice — or “chai masala” as our ancestors called it — has been warming cups and hearts since the late 1800s (as far back as we can trace). The recipe was passed from my great-grandmother to my grandmother, and then to my mum — a legendary home cook with more spice-stained notebooks than shelf space.

When my parents moved to London in 1969, the recipe came with them. My mum kept the tradition alive, brewing big pots of it and constantly experimenting — a habit we happily inherited.

Years later, while I was running music events, Tea Spice made surprise appearances at festivals, gigs, and house parties. People loved it. So much so, we accidentally did a decade of market research without realising.

At a Christmas party in 2011, we handed out gift hampers with our first-ever branded jars (plus a little whisky). It had a silly name back then — too embarrassing to mention — but everyone just called it Tea Spice, so the name stuck.

Since then, it’s grown naturally — blend by blend, party by party — until launching our first online store felt inevitable. Now we get to share it with the world, one sprinkle at a time.