Friday, November 27, 2015

Ginger Cake


by Sheila Connolly

All right, I’ll confess: I am officially addicted to The Great British Baking Show on PBS. I did my best to resist it—I kept seeing the TV listing go by and telling myself I didn’t need to watch one more contrived cooking show where judges make snotty remarks and some poor non-winner ends up near tears. I tried, really. And then I watched one episode (not even the first of the season!) and I was hooked.

I’m a sucker for anything baked. The problem is, many of the recipes the contestants make on that show are complex, and while I admire them tremendously for even trying, I don’t feel compelled to try to make them myself (but I did once make Spotted Dick!). At least I recognized most of them, and I will happily order them at any restaurant or bakery.

But I felt bad that I didn’t recognize either of the judges. In case you’ve never watched the show (your loss!), there are two official judges: Mary Berry, the doyenne of British cookbooks, and Paul Hollywood (really?), who is defined as a “top artisan baker,” whatever that means. There are also two contestant wranglers, Sue Perkins and Mel Giedroyc, who apparently have done a whole lot of successful things together that we on this side of the pond have never heard of.

I was ashamed that I had never heard of Mary Berry, who apparently has been writing cookbooks almost as long as I’ve been around. So of course I ordered one (on baking) immediately. But then I went trolling online for some of her recipes, and found one that she declared that one of her favorites was one that her mother used to make for tea: Ginger and Treacle Spiced Traybake. It sounded tasty (and it has ginger frosting!).





Then I tried to translate the English terms and amounts. Ha. I did add a scale to my kitchen equipment not too long ago, so part of that problem is covered. But the ingredients can be a bit mind-boggling. Muscovado sugar? I think it’s like dark brown sugar. Maybe. Ground mixed spice? Huh? (Don’t panic—I found a recipe! It’s pretty much what you’d expect, but it includes coriander too).







And then there was “stem ginger from a jar.” Right. Had to look that one up! As near as I can tell, it’s crystallized ginger steeped in ginger syrup. Don’t think I’ll find that in my local grocery store! But, miracle of miracles, I had on hand both crystallized ginger and ginger syrup. (Now you know why I buy weird ingredients when I see them.) So I combined them.

Then on to the making of the recipe. Preheat the oven to 180C/Fan 160/Gas 4. Uh, Fahrenheit, anyone? (Would you believe that I have the conversion formula tacked to the corkboard over my desk? And the answer is…350!) Then grease a 12x9 traybake. Okay, I can handle that. It’s a baking tin. Got it.

So here is Mary’s recipe, with a few tweaks for those of us who don’t have all these lovely ingredients lurking in our pantry.


Ginger Spice Cake (inspired by Mary Berry)

Cake:




1/2 lb (8 oz) butter, softened
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
3/4 cup treacle (this comes in dark and light—the dark stuff is pretty intense, if you can’t find it in your stores, substitute dark molasses) (Note: this is sticky stuff, whichever you use. To measure accurately, Mary suggested measuring your sugar, the placing the container on a scale and adding the treacle until you reach the right weight.)






2-1/2 cups white flour
3 tsp baking powder
Dash of salt
1 tsp mixed spice (I had to make my own—if you can’t find or make any, just add cinnamon, cloves, etc.)
4 large eggs (at room temperature)
4 Tblsp milk
3 finely-chopped bulbs of stem ginger from a jar (see above)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease a 9” X 12” baking tin, and line the bottom with parchment paper.




Cream and butter and sugar together in the bowl of a stand mixer. Sift together the dry ingredients and add to the bowl, and beat until well blended. Pour the batter into the baking pan and level the top with a spatula. 




Bake in the preheated oven for 35-40 minutes, or until the cake begins to shrink from the sides and is springy when you touch it. (Do not overcook or it will dry out.) Cool in the pan for a few minutes, then turn it out on a rack to finish cooling.





Icing:

1 cup powdered sugar
3 Tblsp ginger syrup that the ginger has been steeping in
3 Tblsp chopped stem ginger




To make the icing, sift the sugar into a bowl and add the ginger syrup. Mix until it reaches spreading consistency. Pour it over the cooled cake.


Chopped ginger
Sprinkle with the chopped ginger. Let the icing set for a bit before trying to cut it.



The results? This is more of tea cake than a dessert cake. It probably could have used more chopped ginger, but I was improvising. I may order the real stuff and see what it's like.



Meg and Seth are getting married (in case you haven't heard) in "their" restaurant in Granford. The alpacas were not invited, but just about everyone else in town was. Well, maybe not the ex-con...

A Gala Event is available now at Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and other bookstores.

www.sheilaconnolly.com







8 comments:

  1. Your article made me smile this morning! I use give The Great British Baking show a whirl, even just to see if I can identify the ingredients!!!!

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  2. Pat (patdupuy@yahoo.com)November 27, 2015 at 11:56 AM

    I got hooked on that show too. It was refreshing that the contestants were not snarky with each other and the judges gave negative and positive criticisms without being mean about it. I love gingerbread type desserts but this looks too complicated for me. I'll just have to fly to England and try some there!

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  3. Good for you for all that effort!
    Sounds like it would be a lovely thing to have with a cup of tea and a good book.

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  4. I too was addicted to the Great British Baking Show. I could watch it again from start to finish. I loved the relationships and the drama and heartbreak and learned a lot. Am going through withdrawal now. Thanks for sharing Mary Berry's recipe. UK ingredients used to make me crazy but I loved your adaptations.

    It looks super, Sheila! Thanks. MJ/Victoria Abbott

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  5. That cake sounds good! My birthday is toward the end of December and when I was young, I used to want a delicious prune cake for my birthday cake. It was a very moist spice, two layer cake. It was very good!

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  6. I can now add that I've watched the Irish version too (which I think someone said was the original?). The British one is better.

    I'm still roaming the markets here in Ireland (indoor and outdoor) and saying, oooh, I want to try that! I only wish I could bring an entire food suitcase home. And I have three kinds of apples in the fridge (and an oven here that has a mind of its own, and don't get me started on the stove burners, which have no markings at all). Adventures in cooking!

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  7. Books that include recipes are some of the best I have ever read. I have made several of the delicious recipes. slpetera@yahoo.com

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