Gingerbread Cake

The perfect autumn cake - rich, moist and spicy. Drizzled with an orange icing for a beautifully sticky, indulgent treat.

This is one of my favourite recipes for a cake ever. Although I feel that it is a very autumnal cake, perfect for snuggling up with a cup of tea under a big, warm blanket I make this often throughout the year. The combination of golden syrup and brown sugar makes for a perfectly warm, rich flavour - just the right amount of sweetness to have a decent sized biiiigg piece and not feel guilty and sick. Slightly misleading though as it is by no means a healthy cake. Woops.

The beautiful spicy flavour comes from a combination of ginger and mixed spice. These compliment the other flavours and makes for a gorgeous treat to warm you up on a miserable day! The sticky top makes it feel oh-so naughty and adds a fruity, sweet edge. It is just ridiculously simple: icing sugar and orange juice, freshly squeezed or from concentrate, whatever you have to hand!

I made one for my family and friends at home which was gone in no time at all. I also took one into work which was received equally as well - everyone loved it! I don't think I have met a person who hasn't enjoyed this cake. A universally loved cake is a good cake, indeed :)

It's not the kind of cake you can whip up in 5 minutes like a vanilla sponge, it does take just a little bit more effort to cook the golden syrup and the butter then wait to cool etc. and it has quite a long ish bake time so it does need a bit of TLC but it is so so worth it!

Ingredients:

250g self raising flour, sifted

4 heaped tsp ground ginger

1 heaped tsp mixed spice

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

225g golden syrup

125g light brown sugar

2 eggs

250ml milk

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 160c and line a loaf tin with greaseproof paper.

2. Pour the golden syrup and butter into a small. heavy bottomed saucepan and warm gently before adding the sugar. Let it bubble away for a minute or so until it looks like this then remove from the heat.

3. While the syrup mixture is cooling, mix the flour, ginger, spice, baking powder and soda together in a large bowl. Once is it cooled, make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and pour in the syrup. Mix until fully combined.

4. Gently beat the eggs and milk together and add to the mixture stirring until a runny, pour-able concistency is reached. Pour into the cake tin.

5. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until a knife inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave it to set and cool slightly in the tin before turning it out and adding a topping.

6. This cake would be delicious with sooo many toppings: a syrupy butter, cream cheese frosting even vanilla buttercream! I personally enjoy simple orange icing drizzled generously over the top. Add a splash of orange juice to a few teaspoons of icing sugar and mix together thoroughly and pour over the top while still slightly warm. 

Teri x

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