It was the day after 'Harmony Day' so my Branch at work hosted a pot-luck multicultural food feast. I normally wouldn't cook for these things as I'd prefer to spend my out-of-office hours doing things which don't relate to work, but I was persuaded by ethnic-inclusive colleagues to whip up something.
I've tried the chai cupcake recipe from Fergal Connolly's 500 cupcakes book a few times and found the original recipe lacked a genuine chai flavour as it only used chai tea powder rather than raw spices. I substituted 1 tablespoon of chai tea powder for the from-scratch ingredients used to make 4 servings of chai.
My mother got the following chai recipe from a local Indian woman who taught an Indian cookery class:
3 1/2 cups water (for the purpose of these cupcakes, omit this)
1 cup milk
4 black teabags
4 cardamon pods
2 tsp fennel seeds
4 tsp sugar
1/4 stick cinnamon
4 cloves
1/4 tsp peppercorn (optional)
1 inch fresh ginger (optional)
From memory, place all ingredients in a pot til boiling. Simmer until the milk is infused with spices.
Use this recipe in any chai cupcake recipe. It's best to sieve the chai before placing into the cupcake mixture to remove any bitter chunks of cardamon, fennel seeds etc
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