Green Tea Cupcakes

Recently, I purchased a modest-sized bag of green tea (matcha) powder with the intent of trying out some of the recipes I've seen over at my favourite baking sites. I'm a huge fan of the green tea flavour, and would paint my bedroom walls, floor and ceiling the same colour. And trust me, were it not for the fear of being made to sleep in the dog house while my parents hired paint removers and had my room restored to its usual, drab cream-and-rose colour scheme, my humble dwellings would already resemble the inside of a green tea cupcake. This one, in fact.

How was that for a segue? I feel that I ought to apologise in advance for the future incidences of incorrect grammar, unsophisticated expression and unsound logic that are bound to pop up in my posts ahead. Blogging for a public audience is quite a new experience for me; prior to this, I've only had the pleasure of jotting down my jumbled, semi-coherent thoughts for my own viewing, and that of a few friends who actually care about what I ate for breakfast, or my discovery of new yoghurt brands, or my thoughts on the latest episode of NCIS (big fan, BIG FAN).

But this, this public blogging thing - this is much, much more exciting :D

You may have noticed an odd straggler masquerading (unsuccessfully) as a cupcake in the picture above. That is, in fact, a steamed hedgehog bun that my grandmother made using some leftover dough from my second baking project: Piggy Buns, recipe courtesy of Lorraine from Not Quite Nigella!

 

The making of these adorable (and disturbingly edible) creatures will be detailed in a post to come. For now, let us concentrate on these matcha beauties.

I purposely chose a recipe that involved cake flour, since I've never worked with the stuff before and wanted to see for myself whether it truly made for a softer, crumblier and tastier cake. From the three that I, ahem, taste-tested, I can vouch for the effectiveness of combining cake flour with all-purpose plain flour in the recipe compared to only all-purpose plain flour when it comes to making cupcakes. To all the Aussie readers: This (see below) was the only brand I could find in a major supermarket. Are there any other (cheaper) versions available in Australia?

I ended up adjusting a vanilla cupcake recipe from Billy's Bakery which I found on Kwanster's website, adding in three tablespoons of green tea powder to the dry ingredients. I was initially worried about the vanilla essence masking the flavour of the green tea. However, my concerns proved to be unfounded; the green tea flavour was unmistakably present. I also used a method of combining ingredients which I've found to give the best rise to cupcakes.

Recipe for Green Tea Cupcakes
Ingredients (adapted from Billy's vanilla vanilla cupcakes on Kwanster's site)

Makes 30 cupcakes

• 1 cup (2 sticks or 227g) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 2 cups caster sugar
• 1 3/4 cups cake flour, not self-rising
• 1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoon green tea (matcha) powder
• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• A few drops green food colouring (optional)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160°C (or 325°F).

2. Using a spatula, cream together the softened but still solid butter (I microwaved mine for 10 seconds straight out of the fridge) and the caster sugar until there are no visible sugar lumps. Using an electric beater, cream the butter and sugar at an high speed until light and fluffy.

3. In another bowl, combine the cake flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, salt, and green tea powder. You can sift the dry ingredients if you want to. I personally never bother with a sieve, and I haven't ended up with lumps of flour or salt in my cakes (yet).

4. In yet another bowl, combine the milk and vanilla extract.

5. Into the creamed butter and sugar add the eggs, one at a time and beating with electric beater until just incorporated between each addition.

6. Once the eggs have all been mixed in, you can put everything in the three bowls together! Add the dry ingredients and milk to the butter/sugar/egg mixture in turns, alternating between the two, beating well after each addition.

7. Give it a final beating on high power until everything is nice and fluffy (rather than liquidy, which is a sign that you've either added wrong amounts of ingredients or have overbeaten the mixture). At this point, you can add in a few drops of green food colouring if you think the natural greenness of the matcha isn't showing that well.

8. Line tins with cupcake cases. Fill cases with batter until three-quarters full. The cupcakes should rise in the oven!

9. Bake for 17 to 20 minutes, checking after 17 minutes by inserting a toothpick into the cupcake and seeing if it comes out cleanly. If it does, the cupcakes are done baking and ready to be taken out of the oven and transferred to wire racks to cool.

10. You can frost the cupcakes with a frosting of choice after they've cooled completely. I find frosted cupcakes too rich for casual snacking (of which I do plenty!), and prefer to munch on them as is. But there are some wonderful recipes for red bean frosting out there, and everyone knows that red bean + green tea = a flavour match made in paradise.

 

The cupcakes were soft, not too sweet, and had a distinctive but not overbearing green tea flavour. Do try and tell me how they turn out!