As promised, but admittedly much later than intended, here are a couple of recipes which include the homemade crystallised ginger. These are really just recipes I have played with and adapted to suit my needs. I find it incredibly difficult to follow a recipe
Chocolate Gingerbread
(adapted from 'Feast' by Nigella Lawson)
I adore this recipe. So much do I adore this recipe that over Christmas I made it a total of 4 times and 3 of those time I baked them into jam jars.
Yep. You heard me.
Jam.
Jars.
Nothing beats an individual pot of deliciousness where you have to dig though a thick sugary layer of icing to get to the moist chocolatey ginger cake underneath. It makes a great gift and along with miniature macaroon bars and chocolate coated amaretto soaked apricots it's what most people I know got given for Christmas.
Right! The recipe.
175g margarine
125g dark muscovado sugar
2 tablespoons caster sugar
200g golden syrup
200g molasses or black treacle
2 teaspoons ground ginger
Thumb sized piece of fresh ginger peeled and finely grated to a pulp
1 1/4 teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
2 tablespoons warm water
250 ml soya milk
275g plain flour
40g cocoa
175g dark chocolate cut into chunks or chocolate chips
1 cup measurement homemade crystallised ginger or chopped up bought stem ginger
Preheat oven to 170C and line the bottom of a roasting pan with baking parchment. The tin should be about 30 x 20 x 5cm deep. It makes a lot of cake.
I now get a good sized saucepan and put it on my scales and measure the following ingredients directly into it (don't feel you have to but why dirty a bowl as well??): margarine, all the sugars, syrup, molasses, ground ginger and fresh ginger pulp. Heat it all up until the margarine and the sugars have melted all together. I tend to stir it just a little to make sure the sugars aren't sticking to the bottom.
In a small glass mix together the bicarbonate of soda with the warm water.
Take the pan off the heat and mix in the soya milk and the water/bicarb. Stir in the flour and cocoa which has been well sieved. This is important otherwise you end up with lumps of flour. Also, really do use a good sized pan as a small pan also results in lumps of flour. I always end up with lumps as I do not heed my own words and dump un-sieved flour straight into a small pan.
Fold in the chocolate chunks/chips and crystallised ginger and then pour it into the prepared baking tray. Depending on the size of your crystallised ginger the chunks can just sit in a big lump in the middle of your cake batter. Give it a gentle stir to redistribute the ginger and then bake for 45 minutes.
The cake should feel slightly damp underneath the set top. This will mean that the cake will be beautifully moist. Let it cool in the tin and then ice it.
Icing
Nigella suggests heating 30g margarine, 1 tablespoon cocoa powder, 60ml ginger ale (A good one! It is not worth making with a cheap or artificially sweetened ginger ale. I like the ginger ale by Whole Earth or Fever Tree) all together in a pan and then when all melted and heated sieve in 250g icing sugar. Stir. Pour all over the cake.
NEXT!
Chewy ginger cookies
(adapted from 'Vegan with a Vengeance' by Isa Chandra Moskowitz
I don't usually make cookies or biscuits. I have always felt they are easier to buy. I was so wrong. So terribly wrong. Biscuits and cookies are incredibly easy to make and take so little time. Make them. Eat them. Love them.
225g plain flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated/ground nutmeg
125ml sunflower oil
2 tablespoons black treacle
1 tablespoon golden syrup
3 tablespoons soya milk
1 cup measurement crystallised ginger
200g caster sugar
Preheat oven to 180C. Grease 2 baking sheets.
In a large mixing bowl mix together the oil, treacle, golden syrup, soya milk and the crystallised ginger. Sieve the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and spices into the bowl. Mix together to form a soft dough. Roll into 1 inch balls and flatten to a 1 1/2 inch diameter. Place on the baking sheets and bake for 10-12 minutes. They will look uncooked and soggy but take them out. Leave them to cook 5 minutes before moving them on to a cooling rack.
The best way to eat these is to grab 2 cookies and sandwich in some vanilla ice-cream. I made this twice and forgot to photograph it twice. What would be even more amazing would be to take this ice cream sandwich and put it back in the freezer to firm and chill it all, then dip them in melted chocolate and refreeze. Eat!
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