TWD Rewind: Triple Gingerbread Cake (sans Chocolate)

For the week of January 27, 2009, the "Tuesdays with Dorie" recipe was "Fresh Ginger and Chocolate Gingerbread." Somehow I just wasn't feeling enthusiasm for this recipe. I sat myself down and thought about it for a while, and realized -- it's the chocolate. I just didn't care for the idea of gingerbread and chocolate together. (Don't get me wrong, I suspect it's a great combination, it's just that my taste buds were somehow not in the mood.) Now, plain gingerbread, with three kinds of ginger, and maybe a cream cheese frosting on top -- that sounded just right!


So, a little late, I made "Triple-Ginger Gingerbread Cake with White Chocolate-Cream Cheese Frosting" instead. We've been a bit overloaded on sweets lately, so I made 2/3 of the recipe, but baked it in the same size pan (9-inch square) for a thinner cake. I went with bleached all-purpose flour, as I've been reading that bleached flour is better for cakes. Two-thirds of the amount of butter turned out to be an awkward amount -- I rounded up to 8 tablespoons. Then I decided to use 6 tablespoons of butter and 2 tablespoons of oil instead, for a moister cake, which worked well. In the midst of measuring everything out, I discovered we were out of regular molasses and only had blackstrap molasses, which has a very strong flavor. Yikes! I made a quick substitution of half blackstrap molasses and half Lyle's golden syrup. That worked too!

It was hard to figure out how much fresh ginger to use -- I grated mine with my beloved Microplane grater, which turned it into a dense paste rather than a fluffy mince. I used about a tablespoon, I think -- 18 grams. With no stem ginger in syrup on hand, I turned to delicious Australian crystallized ginger instead.

The cake baked up wonderfully moist and springy! And the icing was already in the freezer -- leftover white chocolate-cream cheese icing that I made for the TWD Chocolate Cupcakes for Halloween. (Having a big freezer in the basement is so great...) All it needed was a splash of rum and some finely chopped crystallized ginger.

This is excellent gingerbread, although next time I'd add more ground ginger and crystallized ginger. Spicy gingerbread is what I like!

Thanks to Heather of Sherry Trifle for choosing this recipe! My apologies for doubting you and Dorie -- it was a great choice. (You can also find the recipe here as well.)