Black Tea and Ginger Friands

A long time ago, in a land far far away (Sri Lanka), my great grandfather set up a tea factory in the hills of Ratnapura. It still stands there today and is run by my great-uncle. It makes stellar tea and if you're in the market for some Single Origin estate Ceylon Tea, there's no finer than:

New Vithanakande Estate

Since I love drinking tea, I figured I must enjoy cooking with it right? Hence this recipe. This is an ode to the Sri Lanan tradition of drinking very sweet black tea with ginger.

Ingredients

Melted butter, to grease

Plain flour, to dust

195g (1 1/2 cups) pure icing sugar, sifted

75g (1/2 cup) plain flour, sifted

155g (1 1/2 cups) almond meal

3 eggs, lightly whisked

190g unsalted butter, melted, cooled

4-5 teaspoons of good loose leaf black tea

2 teaspoons of powdered ginger

Icing sugar, to dust

Instructions

Preheat oven to 180°C. Brush thirty 40ml-capacity mini muffin pans with melted butter to grease. Dust with plain flour.

In a small pan combine butter and tea and place on a low heat. 

When the butter is melted remove from the heat and leave to stand for 10 minutes. When the butter has taken on some of the colour of the tea, pour through a fine sieve and leave butter to cool.

Combine the sugar, flour, powdered ginger and almond meal in a bowl. Make a well in the centre.

Add egg and infused butter. Stir until well combined.

Divide among the prepared pans. Divide the raspberries among the centres. Sprinkle with the flaked almonds.

Bake for 15-20 minutes or until light golden. Set aside in the pans for 5 minutes to cool slightly before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

Dust the friands with icing sugar to serve.

Serve with a cup of Ceylon tea.