White chocolate chai blondies are going to your a new Fall dessert staple…for the cozy days in spent watching Netflix, the nights in when you want to impress your friends/family/significant other with an easy batch, or for the holidays. Show up to your small socially distanced Thanksgiving gatherings with a batch of these and you’re bound to impress! These are crackly on the outside, with a gooey, dense, buttery center. They are spicy, comforting, and unique.
What is chai?
If you’re new to the chai bandwagon, allow me to introduce you. Chai literally means tea in India. So when you order a chai, you don’t have to call it a chai tea, by the way. 🙂 Food and Wine posted a very informational article on the origin of chai and what it is. To summarize for the purpose of this recipe: chai is a tea that is prepared with a variety of spices. The base of the tea is typically black tea, and the spice blend can also vary, but almost always has a cardamom base with some influence of cinnamon, ginger, star anise and cloves. To make this recipe as easy as possible, I used ground, dried versions of all of these spices and combined them with my dry ingredients. I also couldn’t find a ground star anise, which means you might not be able to find it either, so I skipped it. Feel free to add it to the spice blend if you do find it! Even though chai literally means “tea,” there is no tea int his recipe. It’s inspired by the spices that go into the tea instead.
If you’ve never had a chai latte, I would recommend going to try one before you commit to this recipe. It’s a warm, piney, spicy, cinnamon-y, aromatic tea that will taste like a hug. If you aren’t a fan of spices, this isn’t going to be for you. But!!! Even if you aren’t a chai fan, you can still make this recipe. A few variations include:
- Snickerdoodle Blondies — just use cinnamon to your taste, instead of the spice blend!
- Basic Blondies (don’t knock a basic blondie) — this recipe yields buttery, dense, gooey blondies and you don’t need a spice blend to enjoy them.
- Salted caramel blondies — make the recipe without the spice blend and top with the salted caramel from my salted caramel apple cinnamon roll recipe.
So long as you stick with the method of this recipe, you can jazz the blondies up however you’d like. Also, I have some great news! You don’t need a standing mixer to nail this recipe! You just need mixing bowls, a whisk, rubber spatula and a baking dish to make the magic happen. Now let’s get baking.
White Chocolate Chai Blondies
Ingredients
Chai Spice Blend
- 1 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp allspice
- 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
- 1 tsp ground ginger
Blondies (Dry Ingredients)
- 2 cups all purpose flour I used bleached *
- 3 tsp corn starch
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 3/4 cup white chocolate chips to be mixed in at the end*
- Chai spice blend 1 tsp reserved for topping
Blondies (Wet Ingredients)
- 1 cup unsalted butter melted
- 1 1/2 cup light brown sugar
- 1/3 cup white granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 egg yolks
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Equipment
- 11 x 8 baking dish
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- Set aside 1 tsp of chai spice blend. In a large mixing bowl, combine all of the dry ingredients and whisk until fully combined. Set aside.
- In another large mixing bowl, combine all of the wet ingredients and whisk until the eggs are fully incorporated and all ingredients are fully combined.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredient bowl and use a rubber spatula to fold them together, until a batter is combined. Keep folding and stirring until there are no clumps.
- Add the chocolate chips into the batter and fold in with a rubber spatula until evenly distributed throughout the batter.
- Prepare a baking dish by lining it with parchment paper. Pour the batter into the prepared baking dish. With a rubber spatula, spread the batter so it is evenly thick in the pan.
- Bake for 35-45 minutes, until the edges are crackled and golden brown and the center of the blondies is fully set. If you have a convection oven, these will probably finish closer to the 35 minute mark. Mine took 45 minutes in a regular oven with no air circulation.
- While the blondies are baking, create the chai sugar topping. In a small mixing bowl, combine 1 tsp of chai spice blend and 2 1/2 tbsp of sugar for your chai sugar topping.
- Once the blondies are done baking, sprinkle them with chai sugar. Let them rest for at least 10 minutes before slicing. Enjoy immediately or keep covered in the fridge for up to 5 days.
Rate & Review
WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THIS RECIPE?
These were a huge hit. I increased the spices by 50% except for the cardamom. Making them again today. thanks for the recipe.