Ever since a certain little nom nom showed up, I have been making food that is a) a hot pocket or b) something that can be prepared in the amount of time that she is entertained by her swing.  Which is about the same amount of time that a hot pocket is in the microwave.    I can’t win.  But I can stir up boxed cake mix!  Woohoo!

So, here we are.  Making boxed cake.  But I wanted to add some flavor instead of leaving it as plain spice cake, so going along the lines of soda cake, I used chai latte as the moisture base instead of just what the box suggests.  And it was warm and comforting and tasty!  You can either make the latte at home (I used a Trader Joe’s spiced chai made with milk instead of water) or you could just as easily buy a chai latte at the local coffee shop and use a cup of that.  Whatever works!

Chai Spice Cupcakes

For the Cake:

1 box of spice cake mix
1 cup chai latte, cooled
1/4 cup oil
1 egg

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.  Mix all of the ingredients until they are well combined.  Scoop into cupcake pan and bake until a toothpick comes out clean, which was about 20 minutes for me.  The cooking time will depend on how big you make the cupcakes.  Let them cool before frosting.

For the Icing:

1 container cream cheese frosting
1 tsp cinnamon

With a mixer, whip the frosting and the cinnamon together for about 5 minutes.  The whipping adds in air that makes the frosting lighter, so if you like heavier frosting then you can just do a quick stir, but I would recommend the whip if you have the time.