Earl Grey Cupcakes
So, I thought this posted back in April, and yet I found it in my drafts. Enjoy a post that is two months late.
With my birthday approaching yet again, I knew I had to go search through the archives of my photos to find these Earl Grey cupcakes with lavender frosting. These are in my top three favorite flavors of cupcakes. In case you need the whole list, in no particular order:
As you can see, cream cheese frosting is clearly the thing tying all of these together. It is an obsession. I will not make cake or cupcakes with anything except cream cheese frosting. I hate butter cream and I don’t care to learn how to make whipped cream frosting because cream cheese frosting is the best. (I actually really enjoy a Publix cake with whipped cream frosting but not enough to make it myself)
Anyways…. So these cupcakes are special because 1. My birthday and that means I can make whatever flavor I want and no one can tell me I need to make a flavor everyone likes. 2. I used Earl Grey tea from The Spice and Tea Trading Post in downtown St. Cloud. I adore their teas and have worked with them in the past to photograph all of their teas. (If you are interested in seeing some of those photos you can find them here) 3. Cassandra (the owner of the tea shop) has a birthday VERY close to mine so I shared cupcakes with her so we could enjoy her tea infused into my cupcakes for our birthday.
I have the directions and ingredients below in the cute little box but I am not going to write it all out because this post is more for me and to be honest, I hate having to scroll a bajillion miles to get to the recipe box. So, the big question now is what cupcake flavor do I make for my birthday this year?
Earl Grey Cupcakes
Equipment
- 1 Small sauce pan
- 1 Stand mixer or hand mixer Stand mixers work better for the frosting but I have used a hand mixer before
- 1 Cupcake pan
Ingredients
Cupcake batter
Frosting
- 1 Block Cream cheese – room temperature
- 1 stick butter – room temperature
- 1/3 C Milk
- 2-3 TBSP Lavender Ensure your lavender is food grade
- 1 lb powdered sugar
Cupcake Batter
- 2 1/2 C all-purpose flour
- 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 8 tbsp salted butter – room temp
- 1 3/4 C sugar
- 2 eggs – room temp
- 3 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 1/4 C whole milk
- 3 tbsp Earl Grey Tea in a tea bag
- 2 tbsp Earl Grey Tea (finely ground)
Instructions
Cake batter
- Place 3 tbsp Earl Grey tea in a tea bag. Place the tea bag in the milk in the sauce pan. Warm the milk on medium low heat for 3-4 minutes. Remove the tea bag and gently squeeze out any remaining liquids in the tea bag.
- The remaining 2 tbsp of Earl Grey tea needs to be finely ground. You can use a coffee grinder or or small blender to achieve this.
- Line baking pan with cupcake liners and preheat oven to 350
- Sift together your dry ingredients for your cake mix, including the finely ground Earl Grey tea.
- On low speed, mix sugar and butter together.
- Add in the eggs one at a time, gently mixing between each egg.
- Add in 1/3 of the dry ingredients with 1/3 of the Earl Grey milk mix at a time until it is all incorporated.
- Place one ice cream scoop of batter into each cupcake liner then bake.
Lavender Frosting
- In the same saucepan as before, add in the milk for the frosting and a tea bag filled with lavender. Cook the milk on medium low heat for 5-7 minutes. Remove and squeeze tea bag. Let milk cool completely, it can be placed in the fridge to speed up this process.
- Cream together the cream cheese and butter. Once creamed, add in milk and continue mixing.
- Add in powder sugar 1-2 cups at a time until the frosting has a consistency that stands on its own when you pull the paddle out of the mix.
- Place frosting in piping bag with your desired frosting tip.
- Once cupcakes are cooled, frost each cupcake.
