Chai Cupcakes
I love tea! I can’t start the day without a strong cup of English Breakfast, followed by an afternoon pick-me-up of Earl Grey and finishing the day with a cup of peppermint tea after dinner. When I feel like indulging I brew up a strong cup of chai tea with an array of spices including cinnamon, cloves and cardamom. I’ve been toying with the idea of experimenting with a chai cupcake for a while and thought this month’s theme of Tea at the Sweet Adventures Blog Hop would be the perfect opportunity to create it.
Quite a few recipes involved using the store-bought “Chai Mix” that I find overly sweet and fake tasting. I decided to make my own blend of spices to add to the batter and finished the cupcake off with cream cheese icing and a sprinkle of cinnamon. Delicious!
- 230g butter, softened
- 1¾ cups sugar
- 4 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 cup milk, room temperature
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1½ cups self-raising flour
- 1¼ cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 2 tsp ginger
- 2 tsp cardamom
- ½ tsp cloves
- ½ tsp nutmeg
- 4-5 cups sifted icing sugar
- 100g butter at room temperature
- 250g cream cheese at room temperature
- Cinnamon to decorate
- Preheat oven to 180°C. Line 24 muffin tins with cupcake papers.
- Cream the butter with an electric mixer until smooth in a large bowl.
- Gradually add the sugar and beat for 3 minutes until fluffy.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
- Sift the 2 flours and chai mixture into a separate bowl.
- Add the dry ingredients in 3 parts, alternating with the milk and vanilla. Do not overmix!
- Fill cupcake liners about ¾ full with mixture and bake for 15 minutes until lightly golden brown.
- Allow to cool in the tin for 15 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack.
- Cream the butter and icing sugar together until well mixed.
- Add the cream cheese in cubes slowly until incorporated. Continue mixing for 5 minutes until the icing is light and fluffy.
- Spoon icing into a piping bag and pipe swirls onto the cooled cupcakes. Sprinkle with cinnamon.
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The chai cookies you and V got me were pretty AMAZING.
How did you find the spice mix and chai-liciousness of the cupcake? Talk flavour to me baby!
Oh wonderful! I really want to try those cookies. Afternoon tea sometime soon? :)
Not to sound up myself but the spice mix tasted AMAZING in the cupcakes. The balance was spot on – not overwhelming but still quite dominant. You knew immediately it was a chai blend flavouring. Very happy!
Your chai mix sounds lovely. Well done for making it yourself. I agree with you on the syrups. It took me ages to find a good chai tea.
Thanks Kyrstie! Making my own spice mix definitely made a huge different to the cupcakes. What is your favourite chai tea? I like T2′s blend.
I agree, a lot of the store bought pre-mixed chais are overly sweet. I love your version, which I bet tastes amazing in your gorgeous cupcakes!
Thanks Jennifer! I was very happy with the chai spice blend and it thankfully wasn’t too sweet or artificial tasting :)
So pretty! i would love to learn to decorate cupcakes like that!
Thank you!! A lot of practice and patience :) I am doing a blog post on how to decorate cupcakes soon. I’m no pro but hopefully there will be some useful tips!
Great post. I love chai but prefer to make my own mix at home, like you. They seem to put a ot of filler/sugar in those packaged mixes, which is a shame. Lovely cupcakes.
Home made is always best! Thanks Christina :)
Great cupcakes. Im obsessed with cream cheese frosting – would go perfectly with the spicy chai :) Thanks for joining the hop!
Cream cheese frosting is my favourite!! I look forward to participating in the hop again :)
Chai and cream cheese – divine! I never touch the mixes, fresh spices are so much better – and your icing looks perfect as usual. So glad you could join us this month!
Thanks JJ! I am definitely going to try and participate in the blog hop regularly – it’s a good way to try out new recipes :)
Such a pretty cupcake and nicely iced :)) It kinda looks like a nice chai latte in cake form :)
Yes I was trying to emulate the chai latte in cupcake form! I thought the cream cheese frosting and sprinkle of cinnamon kind of looked like the top of a chai latte :)
I don’t like tea but think I could handle these babies. Please send over 1 dozen :)
I was going to say please expect a sticky mess arriving shortly in the mail but it sounded gross… haha!
I love tea. I love chai tea. I love cupcakes… my gosh.. your cupcakes are brilliant! I will be making these this coming weekend for sure.
I’ve been getting re-inspired to make more cupcakes for special ocassions after reading this book on Amazon, How to Decorate Cupcakes
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0073H9DDI
Thanks for the great recipe!
Katie
I’m trying to bring everyone’s favourite things together Katie! :)
I want to brush up on my cupcake decorating skills, will check that book out.