Vegan Tea-Infused Cupcakes Recipe

If you're a tea fanatic like me, you might have a large collection of teas hanging around. Yes, you can keep drinking them if you like, but what else can you do with teas? Here's my recipe for delicious tea-infused cupcakes from scratch.

Ingredients for 12 cupcakes:

2 1/2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups water
2/3 cup oil (non-flavored, such as canola)
2 tablespoons vinegar
Two or three tea bags (your flavor of choice) OR two servings (if you were making two cups of tea) tea leaves
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
2. Boil two cups of water (make sure your measurement of two cups occurs after boiling, since evaporation may change any initial measurements of water amounts.)
3. Pour water into a large mug or heat-safe bowl and add your tea bags.
4. Allow tea bags to steep until water is cooled. Tea should be STRONG.
5. Whisk dry ingredients together
6. Add vinegar, oil, and vanilla extract
7. Stain the tea well until no leaves are in the water, then add that to the ingredients
8. Blend the dry and wet ingredients together until smooth
9. Line your cupcake pan and pour the batter in
10. Cook cupcakes for 22-25 minutes

You can leave these cupcakes plain or make a frosting, which begs the questions of flavorings. Your options are to top it with a plain vanilla frosting/glaze, or do something in a coordinating flavor. Here are some nice flavor variations for you to try:

• Green tea cupcakes with lemon frosting
• English breakfast cupcakes with buttercream frosting
• Rose tea cupcakes with chocolate frosting
• Earl Grey cupcakes with lavender frosting
• Anise tea cupcakes (Poe tea?) with violet frosting
• Cinnamon tea cupcakes with apple glaze
• Hazelnut tea cupcakes with vanilla frosting
• Chai cupcakes with buttercream frosting
• Peppermint tea cupcakes with mint frosting
• Raspberry tea cupcakes with pistachio frosting
• Strawberry tea cupcakes with peanut butter frosting
• Earl grey cupcakes with orange buttercream frosting
• Pomegranite tea with coconut frosting
• Chamomile cupcakes with lemon frosting

To add more depth of flavor (particularly to the fruit flavored tea cupcakes) you can add little chunks of fruit, nuts, or chocolate to the cupcakes at your whim. You can, of course, make the cupcakes with your preferred recipe as long as yours involves water in some way (cupcakes that rely on milk or a similar liquid won't work since tea doesn't diffuse in milk well.) Let me know if you stumble onto a particularly delicious combination of flavors!

Happy eating!