so this next recipe - its simple, not fancy... there are no funny stories, no little ancedotes about how i screwed it up... the fact of the matter is, i had recently bought a new loaf pan and wanted to break it in. that little betty crocker fall baking book that i'd gotten on that last target trip (see pear thingies) had a recipe for Chai Spiced Bread and it looked really good. and they listed prep time as 15 mins.
while i know you can drink chai tea any time of the year, i do associate it more with fall & winter. and even though NYC is the new SoCal and its been 78 and sunny for the last million days, i really wanted to welcome october with something a little more... well, fallish.
It turned out that i didnt have enough butter to make the full loaf, but i also have a few mini muffin pans that are so cute and i love to make cute little things in them... and mini muffins are easier to bring into work...
so 1/2 of the recipe worked out perfectly.
Chai Spiced Muffins
Courtesy of Betty Crocker - Fall Baking (doubling of the butter & other slight modifications by me)
Click here to import recipe directly into Pepperplate
muffins:
3/8 c sugar
1/2 c butter (1 stick, pref. unsalted), softened*
1/4 c prepared tea (i used chai. it made sense)
1/6 c light cream (i actually just poured until the tea + the cream made 1/3 c, which is slightly more than 1/6 c of cream.)
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 c flour
1 tsp baking powder
3/8 tsp cardamom
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
1/16 tsp ground cloves
***
Heat oven to 400°. Prepare minimuffin pan by spraying with cooking spray for baking
beat sugar and butter until light and fluffy (med speed).
beat in tea, cream, vanilla & egg (low speed).
the resulting mix will look gross and curdled. thats fine.
whisk all dry ingredients together - flour, baking powder, cardamom, salt, cinnamon, cloves - and then mix the dry ingredients into the wet, by hand, mixing until just combined.
fill mini muffin cups about 3/4 full. bake approximately 15 mins, cake tester will come out clean.
remove from pan and cool on wire rack.
glaze:
1/2 c powdered sugar
1/8 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp light cream
1 tbsp water
additional cinnamon for decoration (optional)
mix first 4 ingredients until no lumps. if too watery, add a little more sugar. if too dry, add a little more water. you want something spreadableand a little drippy, but not a liquid. maybe like honey-consistency?
spread glaze on mini muffins after they have cooled for 10 mins or so. allow to cool some more. sprinkle with additional cinnamon, if desired.
*11/7/07 - it was recently discovered why these ROCK. i accidentally doubled the amount of butter in the original recipe - which means i could have made the loaf. duh... so, anyway, they're low fat and all that ;)
1 comment:
I finally made the muffins. The kitchen smelled wonderful while they were baking and they taste great. Now the question is, how do I keep myself from eating them all up in the next 24 hours? Can they be frozen?
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