Cooking with Tea

The uses of tea are endless! It's not only a warm, comforting drink but it can be used for beauty, health, baking, and more.

In this post, I want to inspire you to not just drink tea, but to cook with tea!

Here are four different recipes and ways to incorporate tea into your everyday cooking .

1) Earl Grey Sugar Cookies

You can add crushed tea leaves to many different things. One very common use of crushed tea leaves is in butter cookies.

Find my recipe for Earl Grey Sugar Cookies here: http://lexalexrecipe.blogspot.ca/

2) Darjeeling Mousse Tart 

Another way to use tea is to steep it in any liquid ingredients. If you're making pancakes, steep tea in the milk. Likewise, if you're baking a cake you could steep tea leaves in the cake batter. In this particular recipe, I steeped Darjeeling in the cream before I made it into mousse.

Find the recipe here: http://lexalexrecipe.blogspot.ca/





3) Jasmine Tea Rub Ribs 

I'm sure you've heard of coffee rubs but there's also such a thing as tea rubs! These amazing ribs are made with jasmine tea leaves. You could use tea rubs in all sorts of meat recipes.

Find this recipe here: http://thewoksoflife.com/2014/07/jasmine-tea-rub-ribs/

(photography from http://thewoksoflife.com)

4) Miso Green Tea and Ginger Tofu Soup

One last way to use tea is in soups. You could steep a bag of tea in almost any kind of soup. Peppermint and green tea would pair lovely with many types of soup. 

Find this recipe here: http://www.sheknows.com

(photography from http://www.sheknows.com)

GF Darjeeling Berry Mousse Tart

GF Darjeeling Berry Mousse Tart 

Find crust recipe here: https://simplygluten-free.com/blog

Filling:

1 cup heavy whipping cream

2 tsp second-flush darjeeling 

2 cups frozen berries

1/2 cup sugar (you can add more or less to taste)

1/4 cup of cold water
1 teaspoon gelatin

(I got my darjeeling from: http://www.teacampaign.ca)

1) Measure heavy whipping cream into a bowl and add darjeeling to steep (set in fridge for at least an hour)

2) Defrost the frozen berries and strain juice into sauce pan - set aside

3) Add gelatin to cold water and let sit 

4) Put berry juice on medium heat and add sugar 

5) Once juice is steaming, add in gelatin and remove from heat 

6) Transfer juice to bowl and set in fridge until thickened 

7) Strain darjeeling tea leaves from cream 

8) Pour cream into mixer and mix on high until small peaks form 

9) Add berry juice to whipped cream and carefully mix together 

10) pour mousse into cooked tart crust and set in fridge 

enjoy!

(this filling recipe makes enough to fill one small tart crust - double or triple the recipe for a large tart)

Mocha Pomegranate Mousse

One of the desserts I made for Thanksgiving was this lovely Mocha Pomegranate Mousse! It turned out   very pretty and flavorful so I decided to share my recipe. If you aren't a huge pomegranate lover, no worries! You can easily substitute the pomegranate with almost any other fruit/ flavor. For example, you could try this recipe using raspberries, blackberries, lemon, peach, peppermint, or even eggnog! 

Mocha Pomegranate Mousse Recipe

Mocha Mousse Layer

1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream 

4 ounces milk chocolate

4 ounces coffee chocolate

4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate

3 tablespoons water 

2 tablespoons sugar

3 egg yolks, room temperature

1) Melt all the chocolate in a double boiler and set aside to cool

2) Crack three eggs and separate the yolks into a bowl. Set aside

3) Put the water and sugar in a small sauce pan. Stir on medium heat until it starts to bubble and become like syrup

4) Add the simple syrup (while still hot) to the egg yolks while constantly stirring 

5) Add the syrup and yolks to the chocolate and mix all together

6) Whip the heavy cream until peaks form

7) Carefully fold all the chocolate into cream until mixed together 

8) Pipe or spoon the mousse into cups/bowls and place in fridge for at least 30 minutes 

Pomegranate Mousse Layer

1 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon unflavored gelatin

1/3 cup pomegranate juice
1/2 tablespoon sugar
6 ounces white chocolate, finely chopped
1 cup heavy whipping cream 

1) Put the water and gelatin in a bowl and set aside (allow gelatin to bloom)

2) Put the pomegranate juice and sugar in a small sauce pan and stir on medium heat. Stir until the sugar is dissolved and the juice becomes more concentrated (once the juice starts to bubble, continue to stir on heat for around 5 minutes). 

3) Put the bloomed gelatin in the pomegranate juice and stir

4) mix the chopped white chocolate into the pomegranate juice. The hot juice should melt the chocolate

5) Whip the heavy whipping cream until soft peaks form. 

6) fold the pomegranate juice into the whipped cream

7) Pipe/spoon the pomegranate mousse onto the chilled mocha mousse

8) Put the mousse back into the fridge for at least and hour

Before Serving

1/2 cup of fresh pomegranate seeds

1/4 cup of chopped/shaved white chocolate 

1) Sprinkle the seeds and chocolate onto the cups of mousse right before serving 

Blackberry Mocha Cheesecake

Yesterday I created this blackberry mocha cheesecake for my brother's birthday. It turned out to be probably one of the best cakes I have ever made! I followed a basic cheesecake recipe and changed quite a few things. Also, I made the bottom of the cheesecake gluten-free!

Blackberry Mocha Cheesecake Recipe

Cheesecake Crust

1 1/2 cup nuts (I used a mix of walnuts and pecans)
1 cup sugar
5 Tablespoons butter (soft)

1) Blend nuts in food processor or blender until finely ground
2) Add the sugar and butter and blend until completely mixed
3) Press mixture into the bottom of a springform pan
4) Bake crust for 12-15 minutes at 350 degrees
5) Take out of the oven and allow it to cool

Cheesecake Filling

32 oz cream cheese (at room temp.)
1/4 cup of sugar
4 eggs
1 stick of butter (4 oz)
4 oz of semi-sweet chocolate chips
6 oz of milk chocolate
6 oz of coffee chocolate (I bought a bar that was coffee flavored white chocolate. You could just add expresso as well.)
4 oz of heavy cream (1/4 cup)
2 oz of sour cream

1) Mix the cream cheese with the sugar. Add the eggs, heavy cream, and sour cream
2) Melt the butter and then set aside
3) Melt all the chocolate in a double boiler (careful not to burn!)
4) Add butter and chocolate to cream cheese mixture and mix until smooth
5) Pour filling over the cheesecake crust in the springform pan
6) Bake cake at 270 degrees for 90 minutes. Turn off oven, open the stove door, and let cake sit in oven for 30 minutes
7) Take cake out of the oven and let it completely cool

Blackberry Mousse 

1/2 Tablespoon water
1/2 teaspoon unflavored gelatin
10 oz of frozen blackberries
3/4 Tablespoon of sugar (you can kinda estimate)
3 oz white chocolate finely chopped
3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
A spoonful of blackberry jam (optional)

1) Combine the gelatin powder and water in a small bowl and set aside (allow it to bloom)
2) Defrost and strain the blackberries to get all the juice
3) Pour the blackberry juice into a sauce pan and add the sugar
4) Over low heat, stir the juice and sugar together until the sugar has dissolved
5) Continue to stir juice over low heat for 4 minutes (allow the juice to become more concentrated)
6) Remove saucepan from heat. Add the bloomed gelatin to the juice and stir until dissolved
7)Add the finely chop chocolate and stir until smooth
8) Set mixture aside and beat the heavy whipping cream until soft peaks form (make whipped cream!)
9) Gently fold the chocolate blackberry juice into the whipped cream
10) Pour mousse onto the cooled cheesecake
11) Swirl blackberry jam onto the top of the mousse (to make it look pretty!)

Now you simply put your cheesecake into the fridge to completely cool. It turns out best if left over night.

Once you remove the cake from the fridge, drizzle some chocolate on top and add some fresh blackberries.

Enjoy!

Chocolate Strawberry Mousse Cake

For Easter dessert, I worked in the kitchen for almost 3 hours making a 3 layer mousse cake. This cake is perfect for chocolate lovers. I also love it because it is gluten free! The recipe I followed originally uses raspberries rather than strawberries. I suggest making the cake the day before you plan to serve it. It serves around 12 people and goes perfectly with a cup of hot coffee. You can find the recipe for this decadent cake here: hungryhappenings.com.

Chocolate Raspberry Mousse

I recently found an awesome recipe for chocolate mousse frosting that looked amazing (Chocolate Mousse Frosting). I changed the recipe up a little by adding raspberries and sugar. It turned out great! If you love coconut, chocolate, and raspberries, then this is a dessert you won't be able to resist.



Chocolate Raspberry Mousse 

• 1 can coconut milk
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup of sugar (more or less depending on how sweet you want it) 
• 1 1/3 cup of Raspberries 

1) Stir the coconut milk, cocoa powder, vanilla extract, and sugar together in a bowl
2) Heat 1 cup of raspberries until warm/hot and strain them, only getting the raspberry juice.
3) Add the raspberry juice to the rest of the mixture
4) Put the mixture in the fringe for 1 to 2 hours (until hard on top)
5) Add 1/3 cup of fresh or frozen raspberries to the mousse
6) Put the mousse in an ice cream maker for around 30 min (it gets hard fast, so keep an eye on it)
    (If you don't have an ice cream maker, put the mousse back in the fridge for a few more hours until it's the consistency you prefer.)

 Once the mousse is done, top it off with some whipped cream and enjoy. I even put some raspberry jam on top of mine. If you aren't a big fan of raspberries you can just not add them. Next time I make it, I plan on trying peanut butter instead of raspberries.