Vanilla Chai Tea Sweet Bread and Meeting The Bigelow Family
This warm, fresh, aromatic sweet bread was inspired by my favorite Vanilla Chai Tea. It’s not just that you can taste this amazing flavor in every bite, the smell while the bread is baking is incredible and fills the house for days.
Let me tell you about an amazing experience I had two weeks ago!
I got to visit the Bigelow factory and corporate headquarters in Fairfield, Connecticut and meet the Bigelow family! Unfortunately, I didn’t get to meet Mr. and Mrs. Bigelow themselves, due to a sickness, but that whole company is one big family. It definitely felt like we met THE Bigelow family.
Four amazing bloggers and I were invited to visit and tour one of Bigelow factories and it was quite an experience. It was amazing to see the whole process of tea making, from blending to packaging. It was very interesting to meet all the people responsible for each stage of the process, as well as to see how intricate the whole process really is. But the best part for me was the tea tasting and learning about tea itself. I never knew just how much was behind that little bag of tea that I steep in my cup every morning.
Walking through the factory, I got inspired by Vanilla Chai tea to create a recipe. I like to pour myself a cup of tea while working every day and while enjoying a cup of Vanilla Chai, I thought that it would be great in fresh baked, sweet bread. I was right! It was amazing and not just the taste. While the bread was baking, heavenly scent filled my entire apartment and it was all I could smell for a couple of days.
Better than any scented candle!
Vanilla Chai Tea Sweet Bread and Meeting The Bigelow Family
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups bread flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 eggs room temperature
- 1/3 cup sour cream
- 1/2 cup melted unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup strong Vanilla Chai tea
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Topping:
- 1 Tbsp vanilla sugar
- 1 Tbsp white chia seeds
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 350 and lightly grease a bread pan.
- Steep 3 bags of Bigelow Vanilla Chai tea in 1 cup of boiled water for 5-6 minutes. Squeeze and discard the bags. You should have at least 3/4 cup left. (Just use 3/4 cup.) Let cool a bit so it doesn't scold the eggs.
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk eggs, sugar, tea, sour cream, vanilla and melted butter until smooth.
- Add flour, baking powder and baking soda and whisk slowly until all evenly incorporated.
- Pour batter into the prepared bread baking dish.
- Mix chia seeds and vanilla sugar together and evenly spread the mixture over the bread batter.
- Bake for 50-60 minutes. (Until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.)
Nutrition
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All images and text ©Lyubov Brooke for ©Will Cook For Smiles. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If using my posts in collections and features, please link back to this post for the recipe.
Disclaimer: Nutrition information shown is not guaranteed to be 100% accurate as most ingredients and brands have variations.
What a great trip! The story is very well written and the recipe sound yummy too! Great job!
what a fun trip Lyuba! This bread looks so fantastic
It looks AMAZING, girl!! I can practically smell it baking…YUM!
That bread looks like MORE! Can’t wait to try out the recipe. So glad I got to share this trip with you and have a chance for another visit. I can’t wait until our next trip!!! 🙂