Gingerbread

I wouldn’t be doing my duty as the American side of this blog if I didn’t share a recipe for gingerbread, the quintessential Christmas food in the U.S. For our non-American readers who might not be familiar with gingerbread, it is, as the name implies, a quick bread or cake made with ginger and lots of those other warm spices like nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves that I used in this pumpkin cake.

The other distinguishing ingredient in gingerbread is molasses, an ingredient similar to honey in texture which is a by-product of the sugar refining process. Gingerbread can also be found in the form of gingerbread men cookies, or as the base for the gingerbread houses Americans decorate for Christmas. It is something that I find tends to be in the same category as pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving or s’mores on the Fourth of July – a dessert that really only gets made around Christmas, which is a shame because gingerbread is to delicious to only be eaten during one month of the year. But I digress.

As much as I love gingerbread, there’s nothing I dislike more than  gingerbread not done well – all too often gingerbread can be dry, bland, and dependent on whipped cream or powdered sugar to spice it up. I’m happy to say that this recipe is none of those things – it is quite nearly perfect. If Christmas could be summed up in a food, it would be this cake. I would even go as far as to say this is something Santa’s elves would probably eat in between making toys and taking care of reindeer – this is so good in fact, that it’s fit for Santa himself, something he would probably fuel up on pre round the world toy delivery on December 24. This is gingerbread at its best -- incredibly moist and fluffy with a deep caramel-y flavor thanks to the molasses, which highlights the spices perfectly. In short, it belongs in your Christmas recipe repertoire.

Looking for other gingerbread recipes? I've got these gingerbread cookies, this gingerbread shortbread, this gingerbread cake with caramelized pears, these dark chocolate gingerbread bars, this pumpkin gingerbread cake, and these gingerbread pancakes.

Looking for more cozy winter recipes? Click here.

GINGERBREAD 

Recipe from www.allrecipes.com. Makes 1 cake to serve 8 people.

Ingredients: 
1/2 cup (100 grams) sugar
1/2 cup (112 grams) butter
1 egg
1 cup (280 grams) molasses
21/2 cups (325 grams) flour
1 1/2 teaspoons (6 grams) baking soda
2 teaspoons (5 grams) ground cinnamon
2 1/2 teaspoons (6.5 grams) ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon (1 gram) ground cloves  
1/4 teaspoon (a good pinch or two) nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon (3 grams) salt
1 cup (240mL) hot water 

Directions:
In a large bowl, cream together the sugar and butter. Beat in the egg, and mix in the molasses. In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves, and nutmeg. Blend into the butter and sugar mixture with a wooden spoon. Stir in the hot water. Pour the gingerbread batter into the prepared pan. Bake the gingerbread until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean, 45-50 minutes. Allow the gingerbread to cool completely before serving.