Gingerbread

I don't foray into the kitchen alone for just any old recipe, but as a general rule something gingery will sway me. It's a little known fact that ginger is a sure-fire ginger girl bait so I can't resist the stuff, & this recipe is easily one of the best ginger-based ginger baits I've had. It's an old-fashioned gingerbread, not a crunchy gingerbread-person biccie, with a texture halfway between a soft fudgey brownie & a carrot cake. The flavour is quite dark, due to the amount of treacle & muscovado sugar, but the lemon icing lightens the whole experience up. This is actually the first thing I've cooked where anyone has said they would pay for it!

The original recipe only asks for two teaspoons of fresh ginger, but we ignored that and have tried both two & four tablespoons, so you should adjust depending on how much you like your ginger. Even at four tablespoons it wasn't spicy at all, but it was definitley the upper levels of gingeriness so I don't think we'd add any more than that next time.

This is one of those recipes that involves a lot of waiting, so impatient people like the other blogger here can get mildly frustrated. For this I recommend giving the impatient person in question a lollypop or something, to sate them while the gingerbread cools completley. This really does taste better once you've let it all cool, like a brownie, it needs to set a bit. The flavour improves if you leave it covered in the fridge overnight as well, so if you can keep boys' fingers off it for that long, make it the night before & eat it all while they're still in bed.

Fresh Gingerbread with Lemon Icing
adapted from How to be a Domestic Goddess.

makes 20 small squares

gingerbread:
150g dairy free margarine
125g dark muscovado sugar (You could substitute brown sugar if you don't have any, I don't imagine it would affect the taste too much)
200g golden syrup
200g black treacle
2-4 tablespoons root ginger, finely grated/chopped, depending on taste
1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
250ml dairy free milk
2 tablespoons ground flax seed
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda, dissolved in 2 tablespoons warm water
300g plain flour

icing:
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
200g icing sugar
1 tablespoon hot water (or more as needed)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 170C/340F/gas mark 3.

2. In a small saucepan, melt the butter, sugar, golden syrup, treacle, ginger and cinnamon over a low/medium heat, stirring occasionally so it doesn't stick. Remove from the heat to cool a tiny bit once everything is melted.

3. Beat the flax seed with six tablespoons of water until thickened, then add the milk and bicarb of soda. Add this mixture to the saucepan. (note- I did this once while the syrup in the pan was still very hot & the bicarb made it quadruple in size within seconds ;P Be warned!)

4. Pour the liquid ingredients into the flour and beat well until mixed. The batter will be very runny so don't worry that it doesn't thicken up.

5. Pour the mix into a greased 25x25cm pan and put on the middle shelf of your oven and bake for 45-60 minutes until firm and risen. Test for doneness with a knife through the centre of the cake, you don't want it to come out too wet, but a little bit of stickiness is good as it will continue to cook for a while as it cools.

6. When the cake is cool (though we have iced the cake without it being fully cool with no problems), whisk the lemon juice into the icing sugar, then add the water and mix to a thick paste. You may need to add a little more water if you feel the icing is too thick, but be careful, you don't want the icing running off the cake. Spread the icing over the gingerbread and leave to set before cutting.