This is one for my grandpa. It’s his birthday!! 77 today (I didn’t tell you that ;))
Ginger cake is so versatile, you can really do anything with it. Muffins, cakes, loaves. Any leftover (ha) can make the base for a trifle or dry it out in the oven and make spicy bread pudding. Let your imagination go wild 🙂
With its complex flavour, it makes such a great cake to ice. It’s not sickly sweet but subtly spicy with three different types of ginger and cinnamon.
You don’t even need to buttercream this cake, either leave it like I’ve suggested for the loaf or drizzle with an icing made from 100g icing sugar and the juice of 1/2-1 lemon. You can’t make this cake bad. Really hope you enjoy it, and fingers crossed my grandpa loves it.
Wish me luck xxx
Ginger cake
150g butter
200g golden syrup
50g stem ginger syrup
150g black treacle or molasses
Dark muscovado sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
3 tsp finely grated fresh ginger
2 balls finely grated stem ginger
250ml whole milk
2 large eggs
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
300g spelt flour or plain flour
For the buttercream:
300g cream cheese, softened
100g butter, softened
1 jar good quality lemon curd
2 balls stem ginger + 2 tbsp of the syrup, grated
3 tbsp icing sugar
3 tbsp maple syrup
1 kilo regal icing
Preheat your oven to 170’C and line a loaf pan and a rectangular baking pan with butter and grease proof paper.
To make the cake put the butter, syrups, treacle, sugar, stem and fresh ginger and cinnamon into a large saucepan and melt over a low heat. Whisk the eggs into the milk and into a separate bowl sift flour and bicarbonate of soda. Let the melted mixture cool down for a few mins before mixing in the eggs and milk. Then add the flour mix and stir to combine, you may need a whisk to dissipate any flour lumps, but you won’t manage them all! Don’t be scared that the mixture is very liquid, you haven’t gone wrong, that’s just how it’s meant to be 🙂
Pour this into the prepared tins and bake for about 30-40 mins. The loaf may take slightly longer as it’s thicker.
Once cooked immediately pour over the remaining stem ginger syrup and then leave to cool completely.
To make the buttercream whisk the room temperature cream cheese until smooth (do this first before adding anything else or you will get tiny lumps that will never come out no matter how much you whisk!)
Add the butter and icing sugar and mix well to combine, then mix in 4 tbsp of lemon curd, the maple syrup and the ginger with the syrup. Whisk well until smooth.
Once the rectangular cake has cooled completely at least an hour, spread over a thin layer of lemon curd. Follow this by a generous layer of buttercream. Set the cake aside whilst you get on with the icing. Knead the icing until it’s smooth and pliable. Roll out to about 1/2-1/4 inch thick, it really depends on how sweet you want the finally result. Carefully cover the cake with the icing smoothing down the side and top. Now to get creative. I’ve made this cake for my grandpas birthday so it’s got to be a book!! Such a nerd lol!! But you can go with whatever you want.
You may be wondering what to do with the loaf cake. Once cooled cut into slices and serve with butter as a teatime treat. Yum!
If you don’t want to make the rectangle shape you could do 2 loaf tins or make muffins out of the batter. Do anything you want, or whatever you have! A great substitute for a Classic Christmas cake, for those who don’t want the hassle or like the traditional 🙂
Hun With An Oven 