Milk Tea Boba Cake
Inspired by brown sugar boba milk tea, this cake is an indulgent treat guaranteed to make you and any boba lover smile! Enjoy!
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Servings: 6
Equipment
- Kitchenaid Mixer or hand mixer
- Our Place Knives and Wooden Cutting Board Set serrated knife only
- plastic wrap
Ingredients
Milk Tea
- 1¼ cup whole milk See Note 2.
- 9 tea bags Ceylon, black tea, or tea of choice
Tea-Infused Simple Syrup
- ½ cup water
- ½ cup white sugar
- 3 tea bags Ceylon, black tea, or tea of choice
Milk Tea Butter Cake (makes three 6" cake layers)
Dry Ingredients
- 2½ cups cake flour 300g, sifted
- 1½ cups white sugar 300g
- 1 tbsp baking powder 12g
- ½ tsp kosher salt 3g
Wet Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temp
- 4 eggs room temp
- ¾ cup milk tea
- 3 tbsp sour cream 50g
Cheese Buttercream Frosting
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temp
- 8 oz full fat cream cheese room temp
- 4 cups confectioners sugar 450g
- 1 tbsp milk
- ¼ tsp vanilla extract
- ½ tsp kosher salt
Brown Sugar Boba
- ½ cup uncooked boba 75g
- water for boiling
- 2 tbsp brown sugar 30g
Instructions
Make the milk tea
- In a saucepan, heat milk just until small bubbles form.
- Turn off the heat. Add 7 tea bags and steep for 30 minutes.
- Remove the used tea bags. Refrigerate and steep overnight with 2 more tea bags. See Note 1.
Make Tea-Infused Simple Syrup
- In a heat-proof container or saucepan, dissolve sugar in hot water until the mixture looks clear. You can use a hot water kettle or the stovetop to heat the water. If using the stovetop, turn off the heat as soon as it's fully dissolved.
- Add tea bags and steep for 30 minutes.
- Let cool to room temp before use. Or refrigerate overnight if you plan to bake another day.
Bake the Cake
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- In a mixing bowl, sift and combine all dry ingredients.
- Add butter to the dry ingredients. Beat for 1-2 minutes, just until the butter is evenly distributed. It will look dry, crumbly, and sandy. See Note 3.
- In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs. Add the milk tea.
- Working in three parts, beat in the egg mixture into the dry mixture.
- Add sour cream. Beat until just incorporated and the batter is smooth.
- Grease three 6" cake pans. Line them with parchment paper, then grease the parchment paper.
- Divide the batter into the cake pans. Our batter weighed about 1200g, so fill each pan with about 400g of batter.
- Bake at 350°F for 27-30 minutes. Remove from the oven when it passes the toothpick test.
- Let the cakes cool for 20 minutes. Then remove from the pans (you may need to run a butter knife around the edges) and place them on a cooling rack.
- Let them cool completely to room temp before assembly. Wrap in plastic and store in the refrigerate overnight, if you plan to assemble the cake another day.
Make Cheese Buttercream Frosting
- Beat butter and cream cheese together until smooth.
- Add powdered sugar, milk, vanilla extract, and salt. Beat 2-3 minutes until well incorporated and fluffy.
- Place in an airtight container and store in the fridge until use. The buttercream will stiffen up due to the cold, so if needed, either leave it on the counter to warm up again, or remix it to loosen it up again.
Make Brown Sugar Boba
- In a saucepan, bring water to a boil. Then add boba and cook for 20 minutes.
- Turn off the heat, cover, and let it rest for 20 minutes.
- Drain and give it a brief rinse with cold water to stop the cooking.
- In a small bowl, mix the boba with brown sugar until dissolved.
Assembly
- Use a serrated knife or cake leveler to level the tops of the cakes. You want to make it as level as possible without cutting away too much.
- Generously brush the simple syrup on the tops of each cake. We used nearly all of it.
- Place a spoonful of frosting on the cake board.
- Place the first cake layer on the board. Add frosting and smooth it out. Repeat for the next two layers.
- Frost the crumb coat. We use a piping bag to distribute the frosting evenly, then used a spatula to smooth it out.
- Wrap the cake in plastic wrap and chill for 30 minutes.
- Add your final layer of frosting. Use a cake scraper to smooth out the frosting. I'd like to warn you that this is the step where perfectionism can get in your way of moving to the next steps. It's totally okay if the frosting is not perfectly smooth!
- Frost a decorative border along the top edge of the cake. This will contain the boba and keep them from falling off the sides.
- Add boba to the top of the cake. Slice and enjoy!
Notes
Note 1. One of the most difficult challenges of this recipe was getting the tea flavor to shine through. When I made the highly concentrated milk tea, I added two more tea bags while it was stored in the fridge overnight. It was a lot of tea, but it worked like a charm and definitely brought out the lovely tea flavor!
Note 2. When making the milk tea, we use more milk than we actually need. Why? Because this process may lead to evaporation and thus yields less milk. Ideally, since we are only heating up the milk, the volume should stay the same. However, through our recipe testing we learned that it is very easy to evaporate the milk too much. Thus, we recommend that you heat up 1-1 1/4 cups of milk to ensure that you retain at least 3/4 cup of milk tea at the end.
Note 3. The total beat time should be no more than 5 minutes. Avoid over mixing by stopping your mixer as soon as everything is incorporated evenly. The end result is a batter that is smooth and slightly fluffy.
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