Lucknow is the capital of Uttar Pradesh and the home of tehzeeb — a word that translates roughly as refined culture, good manners, and civilised grace. The city of the Nawabs of Awadh takes its food, its language, and its hospitality seriously in a way that distinguishes it from every other major Indian city.
Its chai reflects all of this.
Awadhi Chai: Refinement in a Glass
Where Rajasthani chai is bold and Punjabi chai is thick, Lucknawi chai is fragrant. The dominant spice is cardamom — green cardamom, freshly cracked, its seeds bruised rather than powdered so the flavour releases slowly. The tea leaf used is typically a lighter Assam orthodox rather than CTC, brewed briefly so the cup is aromatic without being bitter.
The sugar is sometimes replaced with misri — rock sugar crystals, which dissolve more slowly and give a cleaner sweetness than refined white sugar.
Traditionally, Lucknawi chai was served in small china cups rather than kulhads or steel glasses — the Nawabi court's preference for delicate crockery influencing everyday hospitality culture in ways still visible today.
Hazratganj: The Heart of Old Lucknow
Hazratganj — the main commercial boulevard established by Nawab Nasir-ud-Din Haider in the 1820s — is Lucknow's social axis. Its café culture mixes old-Lucknowi tea stalls with modern cafes, but the old ones are worth finding.
Ram Asrey (established 1805) on Hazratganj is primarily a sweets shop, but its chai counter at the front serves cardamom chai with malai gilori (silver-foil-wrapped paan parcels filled with sweet cream) — the classic Lucknawi after-meal combination. This is dessert-as-chai-pairing culture at its most sophisticated.
Chowk: The Old City Chai Trail
The Chowk district — Lucknow's old commercial quarter — is where the most traditional chai culture survives. The narrow lanes around the Bara Imambara and Rumi Darwaza (the great Ottoman-style gateway, 18th century) are lined with chai stalls that have operated for generations.
The most famous is a nameless stall at the corner of the lane leading to Bara Imambara — the owner, a third-generation chai maker, makes his tea in a small copper bhagona and serves it only in small kulhads. He makes perhaps 50 glasses an hour and will not discuss scaling up.
The Tunday Kababi and Chai Pairing
Lucknow is famous for its galouti kebabs — so finely minced and spiced that they melt on the tongue without the need for teeth (allegedly developed for a Nawab who had lost his teeth). Tunday Kababi, established in 1905 in the Chowk area, serves the most celebrated version.
The correct accompaniment is a small glass of cardamom chai afterwards — the fragrance of the tea cutting through the richness of the lamb and resetting the palate. This pairing is as old as the kebab itself.
“📍 North IndiaIn Lucknow, even the smallest cup of chai is served with a degree of care that makes you feel, for a moment, like a Nawab yourself.