Chai Tea Cupcakes

I myself am not a big fan of chai tea, but someone I adore does. When I see chai I always think of Elisha so when I saw these Chai Tea Cupcakes, I knew I'd make them for her. The original recipe that I found on Mady by Melis is below.

For me, the recipe made 8 cupcakes. I like a little dome top on my cakes so I may have filled the cups more full then others would but I think that the recipe really could yield about 12 cakes if you only fill the cups about half way. Or even better, 24 mini cupcakes.

For the frosting I used Magnolia's Vanilla Buttercream recipe, which I found on the Food Network site along with Magnolia's recipe for vanilla cupcakes. The recipe can frost about 24 cupcakes so I cut it in half and there was still plenty left over. Maybe I made it wrong but the consistency wasn't what I was expecting (not as stiff as I would prefer) but the good thing is it gave my cupcakes a frothy topping, like a chai latte.

Oh, and of course I used eco-friendly unbleached cupcake liners for my always green conscience friend, Elisha. They are made by IF YOU CARE® and also have a variety of other environmentally friendly products.

Chai Tea Cupcakes

Ingredients

1/2 cup milk
1 or 2 chai tea bags
1/2 cup sugar
2 oz butter, softened
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground cardamon
pinch of salt

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place liners into cupcake pan.
Heat up milk on stove, remove from stove. Place tea bags into milk, cover and steep for 5-10 minutes.
Cream sugar and butter together. Mix in egg and vanilla. Mix in milk.
Sift flour, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, cardamon, nutmeg, cloves and salt together. Mix dry and wet ingredients together.
Divide batter into cupcake liners. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until a tester inserted comes out clean.
Allow to cool before frosting with your favorite buttercream frosting. Sprinkle with cinnamon.