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Gingerbread cake

Updated: Tue, 17 December, 2024

⯆ JUMP TO RECIPE
The best gingerbread cake festively spiced, layered with orange marmalade, studded with preserved ginger and with maple glaze on top. It is devastatingly delicious.

gingerbread cake cuisinefiend.com

Gingerbread or gingercake?

I used to think ‘gingerbread’ referred only to biscuits and houses until I saw cranberry gingerbread cake in New York Times Cooking, promptly tested. (This is actually a further variation on that good template). It turns out gingerbread cake, though sounding like a tautology, is a legit culinary term.

I guess the English language and cuisine struggle with ginger productions.

Polish piernik is piernik after all. Likewise in other, culinary conscious tongues that bake with honey and ginger: Honigkuchen, pain d’epices, panforte and peperkoek are all decisively cakes not biscuits.

The only similar English bake I can think of is parkin, but if I tried calling my cake parkin, everybody would go ‘ee ba gum’ while suppin’ t’ brew.

gingerbread cake with orange marmalade layer cuisinefiend.com

Ginger is not so important

Gingerbread encompasses a whole range of bakes, from cakes to gingerbread houses. It doesn’t originate from a type of bread though, because the name comes from Latin via Old French, gingembras, and meant ‘preserved ginger’.

So not only it wasn’t bread, but not obligatorily associated with the spice, ground ginger: in the old days the spice mix might include predominantly saffron or pepper.

These days, regionally varied, the gingerbread flavour is a mix of all or some of cardamom, coriander, allspice, pepper, aniseed, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger and pepper.

And the dough or batter can be more or less rich, with eggs, butter or milk, but always – or so you’d think – includes honey.

gingerbread cake with maple glaze cuisinefiend.com

Not always honey

But honey is expensive, making cakes like the French pain d’epices quite costly. Some, again geo-varied, gingerbread confections are made with brown sugar, golden syrup, or molasses and maple syrup like the recipe below.

Are they inferior for the lack of honey? I don’t think so.

easy christmas gingerbread cake cuisinefiend.com

How to make gingerbread cake batter

The other wonderful thing about gingerbread cakes, apart from the gorgeous festive flavour, is how easy they are to make.

Whichever recipe you reach for, French, German or Italian, it’s going to be really basic: warm up the butter, milk, honey and/or an alternative, plus anything else liquid as required, then pour it into the dry ingredients.

melting butter and sugars cuisinefiend.com

The proportions will vary, the spice combination may differ, it will be sweeter or less so but the principle is always the same.

And likewise this recipe. The flour with the raising agents and all the spices in a bowl, the sugars and butter melting together in a pan. Then all it takes is to combine them, add eggs and whisk the batter until smooth and lump-free but still very runny.

gingerbread batter cuisinefiend.com

The ginger element in this instance is some fresh, grated as well as some finely chopped preserved ginger, for the interest and texture.

baking gingerbread cake cuisinefiend.com

Baking, filling and glazing

After it’s baked which takes just over half an hour, and cools completely, slice it horizontally in half with a sharp knife, a bread knife or a cake cutting wire.

sliced cake cuisinefiend.com

Spread the bottom half generously with your preferred marmalade or jam and sandwich with the top half.

baked gingerbread cake cuisinefiend.com

The glaze is simple but delicious: milk whisked into icing sugar with cinnamon and some maple syrup. You can of course decorate the top before the glaze sets, using almonds, walnuts, more preserved ginger or festive sprinkles of your choice.

And like all gingerbread, this cake keeps extremely well, wrapped in foil or parchment.

glazed cake cuisinefiend.com

More gingerbread cakes recipes

Old fashioned Yorkshire parkin is a sticky, glorious cake full of ginger and spice, treacle and golden syrup, thoroughly traditional for the Bonfire Night and as good for Christmas.

Sticky cranberry gingerbread cake with molasses and maple syrup. Easy to make, sweet, spicy and tart, it's just perfect for the festive season.

Pain d’épices is a delicious honey and spice French gingerbread cake, not overly sweet in spite of the huge amount of honey it contains. It’s spiced with cinnamon, ginger, star anise, cloves or whatever spice combo is your personal favourite.

More Christmas bakes recipes

Pandoro means 'golden bread' and it's Italian festive brioche-like cake baked in a tin shaped like a star. It's deliciously rich and fluffy but unlike panettone, its famous Christmas rival, has no candied fruit or peel.

Danish marzipan kringle, the perfect cake for festive times is easier to bake than most Christmas breads and it is insanely delicious. Especially with homemade marzipan remonce (filling).

Traditional Christmas fruitcake, my family recipe going back three generations. Polish Christmas keks, teacake or fruitcake is lighter and more delicate than its English counterpart, though its name is derived from English Christmas cake.

gingerbread cake with jam and maple icing cuisinefiend.com



Gingerbread cake

Servings: 16Time: 1 hour

INGREDIENTS

  • 110 g (1 stick) butter
  • 130 g (23 cup) dark brown sugar
  • 120 ml (12 cup) whole milk
  • 120 ml (12 cup) maple syrup
  • 60 ml (14 cup) molasses
  • 185 g (112 cups) plain flour
  • 1 tbsp ground ginger
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • a pinch of black pepper
  • a pinch of ground cloves
  • 12 tsp fine salt
  • 12 tsp baking powder
  • 14 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 112 tbsp grated fresh ginger (about 5 cm piece, peeled)
  • 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
  • 100 g (12 cup) preserved ginger, chopped (stem, crystallised or glace ginger)
  • 12 jar orange marmalade (or apricot jam)
  • For the glaze:
  • 100g (1 cup) icing sugar
  • 12 tsp cinnamon
  • 2 tbsp maple syrup
  • 2-3 tbsp milk


METHOD

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/gas 4. Line a square or round 23 cm (9 in) tin with parchment. Place the butter with the brown sugar, milk, maple syrup and molasses in a small pan and stir over medium heat until the butter melts.

2. Mix the flour, ground ginger, cinnamon, salt, pepper, cloves, bicarbonate of soda and baking powder in a large bowl. Pour in the butter mix and stir energetically with a spatula until lumps disappear. Stir in the fresh ginger, then beat in the eggs and stir in the preserved ginger pieces.

3. Pour the batter into the tin – it will be very runny. Bake for 30-35 minutes until a skewer inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean. Cool completely in the tin.

4. When cold, remove the cake in the parchment from the tin onto a chopping board. Slice it in half horizontally using a serrated bread knife or a cake wire. Carefully lift the top half (the top remains sticky even when the cake is cold).

5. Stir the marmalade with a spoon or warm it up slightly if very thick and spoon it over the bottom half of the cake. Spread evenly with a palette knife and cover with the top half.

6. Beat the maple syrup into a bowl with the icing sugar and cinnamon. Add enough milk for spreading consistency. Pour it over the cake and spread evenly with a palette knife. Let it stand for at least half an hour so the glaze sets.

7. To serve trim the edges and keep for yourself as chef's bonus – just kidding. Cut the rest of the cake into neat squares to serve.

Originally published: Wed, 28 November, 2018


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QUERINO DE FREITAS
@NONE
LOVELY.....I LOVE GINGER BREAD OR GINGER CAKE....I DO BAKE THIS SOMETIMES AND I USE GINGER JAM WHICH KEEPS THE CAKE MOIST AND IT COMES OUT LIKE THE THE JAMAICA GINGER CAKE..WITH ICE CREAM ITS REALLY A TREAT,..THANKS QUERINO
3 years ago
1 

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