Green Tea Passion Fruit Cupcakes W/ Ginger Buttecream Icing

Spicy Frosting.

I had a bunch of these pique tea packets left and they were so fun to work with, I decided to try another recipe! Last time I made this cocktail with them. I knew this tea would be great in a cupcake, all I had to decide what kind of frosting to create with it!

I know what ginger is a fun flavor with green tea and I thought, ginger buttercream? Why not?! I'm not blogging to be boring, I want to be adventurous!

All you have to do is mix the pique tea crystals with the milk in the recipe. I encourage you to use whatever amount you think is best but I honestly like to have a strong flavor so I used 4 packets in the 1 1/4 cup of milk! Do this step first before starting the recipe and place your tea infused milk into the fridge until it's time to add it to the batter. You don't need to heat your milk, but you can if you'd like!

I tried  a little experiment using mini cup cake papers but honestly I wouldn't do it again. Use full cupcake liners, you'll make less than is what is shown here but they will have a better shape.  

This tea has fragrance has such a wonderful and it's apparent in both the batter and when they're baked!

You may have seen the "spicy frosting" heading at the start of this post. I won't lie to you, with 2 tablespoons, this frosting had a KICK. If you want the ginger flavor with less of the kick I would mix everything together and gradually add in ginger to your taste. 

But let me tell you something about this spicy frosting...IT IS AMAZING. I thought it would be a bit strange but I really liked the spiciness contrasted by the sweet cupcake and the flavor of green tea! 

Yes, cupcakes were harmed ...I mean eaten...in this process!

Another note about the actual cupcake. These are THICK. If you want them to be a little less thick you can add a tiny bit more milk, try a few additional teaspoons. I actually loved how thick they are because they are a perfect for pairing with tea! I wanted to add this note though because not everyone likes cupcakes to be this way. 

As always, I suggest that you enjoy these cupcakes with tea :) 

You can check out Pique Tea here and see all their teas! These last a while because there are a bunch of packets in one box and I think theyre great for on the go tea without sacrificing the flavor! 

Almond Cupcakes with Matcha Buttercream

Buttery Matcha.

You all know how much I love matcha and It's so fun to bake with. I've been drooling over matcha pictures on instagram everyday and decided it was time to make matcha frosting. I know some people don't like frosting but it's my favorite part of any cake or cupcake!

I'll be honest, I don't have every baking tool in the book so sometimes things get a little messy. I finally upgraded with a simple ice cream scoop to help eliminate mess! I originally got it to make cookie dough placement easier (and future ice cream making?!) but found it to be very useful for this batter as well. I filled each liner up with about two scoops. Some liners were a little over 3/4 way full and those are the cupcakes that had a bit of a top. I don't mind this, it actually means more area for frosting! BUT if you're the type of person who likes to have very neat, not overflowing cupcakes I would suggest using a scoop and a half or one heaping scoop! After I had the desired amount in the liner I took a chopstick into the center of the batter and swirled it in circles. This helped the batter settle. 

Ah, matcha buttery frosting. YUM! I decided to use almond and matcha as a combination of flavors because I kept seeing this combo EVERYWHERE. Thinking about the heavy, full flavor of matcha and the fragrance of almond I wasn't sure if they would be good together but I as wrong! The almond flavor in this cupcake is very light and airy which goes so well with the heavy butter and matcha frosting. In my recipe, I talk about "pours" for the almond emulsion. My emulsion is very thick and comes out slowly so when I say pours I mean it literally. Each time I tipped the bottle over my bowl a drop came slowly out. I did it 3 times. You are welcome to do more or less based on how much you enjoy the fragrance and taste of almond!

Ok, so I originally wanted to do a frosting rose on top of the cupcakes. As you can see that didn't happen. I love watching cupcake and cookie decorating videos and I've been wanting to try this one method of making the rose. I thought I had the right tip but when I started piping got this short thin piece of frosting and decided to improvise. One small note, as I started piping I put too much frosting in the bag so my hands were gradually warming up the frosting. You can see in the photo below thinner and thicker lines. I put mine back in the fridge to cool it off before I continued.  

You're probably wondering about these pizza slices. My original plan was to create matcha frosting because the pastel green was perfect for spring. I then put one of these pizza sprinkles, yes they're sprinkles from Tiny Kitchen Treats, on top and I LOVED how it looked! Does an almond cupcake with matcha buttercream and a pizza sprinkle make sense? Who knows, but it sure looks cute! 

So what's the verdict? Matcha donuts are good. Matcha scones are better. Matcha buttercream is queen! 

As many of you may know, matcha is in powder form because it consists of the ground up leaves. This is said to increase the health benefits because you're ingesting the actual leaf instead of brewing it and throwing it away. In powder form, it is also much easier to incorporate into your cooking and baking! So these cupcakes a kinda healthy, right ? ;)

The almond cupcake recipe was adapted from this one