Gingerbread Coffee Cake
Gingerbread Cake before baking
Here is a simple but tasty coffee cake that is way easier than you might think.
I don’t recall where this recipe came from, but it makes me think of a 1950s housewife sitting down with her next-door neighbour to enjoy a coffee-time treat before the kids come back from school. It has an unfussy, quick to prepare recipe and smells delightful as it bakes.
Watch the video below to get an idea of how easily this cake comes together:
As with any other cake, getting it into the oven shortly after you mix it is very important, as the leavening of the baking soda starts as soon as the wet ingredients are added. It’s also essential to have the oven pre-heated before you mix the wet ingredients into the dry. An oven that’s too cold will also cause the leavening to fail or only partly work.
- 1 cup shortening
- 1 tsp ginger
- 2 cups flour
- 1 cup white sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 cup sour milk *
- 2 TBSP molasses
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp salt
- Mix flour, ginger and sugar together and cut in shortening. Use a pastry cutter or two knives to cut shortening until it resembles coarse oatmeal.
- Reserve ½ cup of mixture for topping; put aside.
- Make a hole in the middle of the mixture.
- Add egg, sour milk, molasses, baking soda and salt to hole in the centre.
- Mix well and pour into a greased 9” x 13” pan.
- Sprinkle reserved crumb mixture on top.
- Bake at 375F for 30 minutes. Test centre to see if it is done using a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out clean, it is done.
- * You can make sour milk by adding 1 TBSP of white vinegar to the milk.
Gingerbread Cake
(I really need to make a special spot in my cupboard to store baked goods to keep them away from the dog!)
As I was preparing to write this blog, it came to me that serving this with a drizzle of caramel sauce might be very tasty – but, of course, I don’t have any cake left to try this with now!
Let me know how your cake turned out in the comments below.