The Best Ways to Easily Add Tea to All Your Recipes

If you only drink tea, you have quite a bit of exploring to do. Tea goes far beyond your hot or cold beverage. You can consume tea in countless ways from tea-infused cocktails to desserts and even noodles! 

Are you using tea to its fullest? In a recent blog, we went through some not-so-typical uses for tea that included everything from scrubbing pans to aromatherapy bath soaks. But how often do you use tea in your cooking or baking? 

Adding tea to your recipes is super easy. When you think of adding tea to something, desserts might come to your mind, at first, but tea shouldn't stop there! It turns out, you can do a whole lot more with tea infusions and add it to your meals and snacks — the only limitation is your imagination.

Making a Tea Base - Broth, Butter, Oil, and Milk Infusions

If your recipe already calls for oil, milk, butter, or broth you have an excellent starting point for creating tea-infused ingredients. Adding tea to any recipe is ridiculously easy when a tea infusion is involved. In fact, choosing the type of tea to add to your dish is the hardest part.  

Simply heat up the oil, butter, milk, or broth, and steep the tea in the hot liquid for at least five minutes. If you want a stronger flavor add more tea leaves. Strain the tea leaves out of the infusion, cool it down if needed, and add it to your recipe as you normally would.

How to Use Tea in Baking and Desserts

Buttery Tea Cookies

A hearty tea cookie pairs so well with a fresh cup of tea, but what about tea inside your tea cookies? That sounds like a win-win! You can add tea leaves directly to your cookie batter or add a splash of strongly steeped tea. 

Shortbread cookies will benefit from the addition of any kind of dark or potent tea. You can even mix your fruity jams and spreads with an infusion of complimentary tea — maybe a Wildlberry Melange Herbal Tea — for your secret-ingredient thumbprint cookies. 

Soaked and Sweetened Cakes

One of the best ways to keep your cake from drying out is to brush the layers with a sweetened tea soak. Mix a little honey or sugar into your hot and freshly steeped tea of choice. As the cakes come out of the oven poke them with a toothpick or fork all over and brush the cakes with the sugar tea.

The warm cakes absorb the tea quickly so you may want to apply the sugar mixture a few times to make sure your cakes are infused with enough flavor. Once your cakes are cooled completely, decorate them as usual. For an extra burst of tea flavor add the same kind of tea to the icing or frosting as well. 

Creative Ice Creams and Custards

Custard-like desserts are one of the best mediums for tea infusions. Heat up your cream or milk and steep the tea in the liquid for at least five minutes before straining and cooling down. With this simple infusion trick, you can make anything from Chai Tea crème brûlée to Jasmine Green Tea ice cream and even Coconut Biscotti Tea-flavored flan.

Infused Chocolate

Anyone who has worked with chocolate knows that chocolate, although delicious, can be finicky. Add a decadent Earl Grey Tea or Spice Tea directly to your melted chocolate for an extra burst of flavor. But, here’s a fair warning: chocolate will seize if any water or moisture makes its way into the bowl. So, be sure to add only dry tea leaves directly to the chocolate and let the leaves naturally infuse into the warm liquid as it cools. 

How to Use Tea in Snacks and Salads

Fruity Applesauce

Applesauce is so easy to make, and you can use tisane tea — also known as herbal tea — to add extra fruity flavor. Heat up cut and peeled apples over the stovetop with a hearty splash of steeped herbal tea until the apples are soft. Smash them with a potato masher or fork to enjoy homemade fruity applesauce — a healthy snack without any added sugar that you can feel good about.

Guilt-Free Popsicles

Popsicles are a perfect summertime treat that helps cool down everyone in the family — from parents to kids. With herbal tea popsicles, you can keep everyone cool and also keep an eye on their sugar intake. Simply steep a strong batch of hot herbal tea — like Strawberry Hibiscus Bloom — strain, and freeze the tea for sugar-free, guilt-free, and caffeine-free snacks. Add frozen berry bits or sliced grapes for a little burst of natural sweetness.

A Spin on Salad Dressings

Salad dressings are a creative way to add some of that delicious tea flavor to your bed of greens. You can infuse your olive oil with tea and let it sit on the counter — allowing it to get stronger over time. Or add a small but strongly steeped dose of tea to your dressing for an extra burst of unique flavor. 

How to Use Tea in Cooking

Flavorful Rice and Quinoa

You can use tea in place of water for just about everything, including rice or quinoa. You can switch out the water for an equal amount of steeped tea. You can also add tea leaves directly to the recipe for a more potent flavor that comes from a longer steeping time.

Refreshing Cha Soba

Did you know that some noodles are already made with tea? Cha soba is a kind of Japanese noodle that is made with buckwheat and green tea. These beautiful green noodles are served chilled over ice and dipped in a refreshing potent broth during the scorching summer months. 

Juicy Chicken Salads

Brighten up any chicken salad recipe with a splash of bold tea. Steep a very strong cup of your favorite complimentary tea and add it directly to your chicken salad, leaves and all! It adds a burst of flavor and helps keep the chicken a little more juicy. Try a plain English Breakfast Tea or a daring fruity blend like Pineapple Ginger Green Tea — if there’s fruit in your chicken salad a fruity tea might help bring out the flavor. 

How to Use Tea in Cocktails and Smoothies

Unique Cocktails

Tea and cocktails? Yes, please! Herbs and alcohol always pair well together, and so do tea and alcohol. Tea is — after all — a potent and versatile herb. 

You can infuse any alcohol with a complimentary tea. Infuse a potent high-quality oolong tea within a bottle of gin and just let it sit for a while — a few weeks or maybe a few months or even longer. You can also infuse bourbon or whiskey with a strong pu-erh or black tea. The longer you let the ingredients meld together, the more complex the flavors will become. 

Energetic Smoothie Booster

Want to give your smoothie a burst of extra flavor? Switch out your plain boring ice cubes for iced tea cubes. Steep a strong batch of tea before freezing it in an ice cube tray and use the cubes as needed. If you steep green or black tea, you might just get a little caffeine boost too. 

Organic Teas and Handcrafted Teaware

Do you have a recipe in mind that you can doctor up with a splash or infusion of tea? No matter the kind of tea you decide to use, you want it to burst with flavor. Teabloom carries USDA Certified Organic teas that are grown naturally on reputable farms and estates. 

From the start, Teabloom has been on a mission to elevate and clean up the tea industry one teacup at a time. Their teas are exquisite, but their teaware is even more extraordinary. Each piece is handcrafted from borosilicate glass — a revolutionary and clean material. Teabloom always has the flavor of your tea, your health, and the sustainability of the planet in mind. 

Discover a better way to enjoy tea and start a new clean tea ritual with help from Teabloom, today.

www.Teabloom.com