Vanilla chai cake
A vanilla chai cake with spiced chai cake layers along with a simple and mildly spiced vanilla cream cheese frosting.
Ingredients
For the cake layers
- 1½ cups milk
- 1½ tbsp chai / tea powder
- 2¼ cup all purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- ¾ tsp salt
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ¼ tsp ground cloves
- 1 tsp ground cardamom
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- ½ tsp ground allspice
- ¾ cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1 cup granulated white sugar
- ½ cup brown sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
For the frosting
- 225 grams cream cheese, at room temperature
- 1¼ cups unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 3 cups icing sugar
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ¼ tsp ground cinnamon
- ¼ tsp ground cardamom
- ⅛ tsp ground allspice
For decorating the cake
- ground biscuit crumbs, as needed
- pistachios, powdered
Instructions
To make the cake layers
- Pre-heat an oven at 180°C for 10 minutes. In a pan bring the milk and chai / tea powder to a boil. Take it off the stove and let it seep for 10 minutes. Strain and keep aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, add the flour, salt, baking powder and all the spices and whisk well.
- In another mixing bowl, add the softened butter along with both the sugars. Beat until light and fluffy.
- Add egg, one at a time and beat well.
- Add the vanilla extract and mix it well.
- Add ⅓ rd of the flour mixture and beat until fully incorporated.
- Add ½ of the chai milk and beat until it is incorporated. Repeat the process for the rest too. (3 additions of flour and 2 additions of chai milk)
- Grease the cake tins with butter and line it with parchment paper. Divide the batter equally into three cake pans and bake in a pre-heated oven for 25-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
To make the frosting
- In another mixing bowl, add cream cheese and butter at room temperature and beat in a medium speed until smooth.
- Add icing sugar, vanilla extract and all the spice powders and beat until combined and creamy.
To assemble the cake
- Cool the cake layers completely. Place one cake layer on the cake stand and spread the frosting evenly. Repeat with all the layers and crumb coat the cake. Chill for 30 minutes before frosting the cake and decorating it. Serve chilled.
Notes
- If you want the chai flavor to be very strong then let it seep for some more time too or even add another half tablespoon of chai powder.
- You can use tea bags instead of powder too.
- Make sure that all your ingredients are at room temperature.
- Do not over beat the batter.
- You can divide the batter in two pans if you want two layers.
- Bake the cake layer for 25 minutes. If it is still uncooked , then bake for extra 5 minutes or until a toothpick inserted at the center comes out clean.
- Do not open the open often while baking. This will make your batter to not raise.
- While beating the cream cheese and butter, beat just until fully incorporated. If you beat longer, then the cream cheese might start to separate.
- If your frostings tends to sperate or curdle, then try chilling it for some time and then beating again.
- For the frosting, use icing sugar only. Powdered sugar might contain granules which makes the cream cheese curdle.
- You can replace vanilla extract with vanilla bean paste too.
- Always cool the cake layers completely before frosting. It is even better if you chill the layers before frosting.