Posted in Recipes on 29.11.2018
Ginger Cake
prep: 15 mins / cook: 45 mins / inactive: 0 mins / total: 60 mins / quantity: 16 squares Print recipe?
Light, moist, vegan and gluten free Ginger Cake sponge spiced with all the flavours of Christmas! Topped off with sticky sweet icing and crystalised ginger.
How are you all doing with your Christmas preparations? I want to say that, as I write this, I’m actually not panicking about Christmas. This is an absolute first for me. But I also really REALLY don’t want to tempt fate. Getting ahead with Christmas baking has really helped. And whilst this vegan ginger cake won’t keep from now until The Big Day it’s a great feeling having a go to recipe that’s full of those seasonal warming spices and SO simple to make.
I’ve also made this a gluten free ginger cake thanks to the amazing ingredient that is Hodmedod’s Fava Bean Flour. I use this stuff a LOT. It makes perfect gluten free pastry, even in lemon meringue pies because (in case you were wondering) nope it doesn’t make the end product taste like beans! It’s a really fine, light flour with a very mild flavour and whilst Phil and I aren’t gluten free, we know a lot of people are. And beans are so very good for you, no reason not to cram them in whenever you can!
Good to have something to balance the sticky sweet icing drizzled on top right?
It also couldn’t be more simple to make this ginger cake – mix the dry ingredients, mix the wet ingredients then mix the two together and bake. Even the icing on the top is just powdered sugar and water mixed to a thin paste then splattered ‘artistically’ across the top!
We had to ration ourselves with this cake by Phil taking it to work. He’s a hollow-legged ginger fiend who not only looks forward to Christmas for general food and all the presents but it’s this time of year I use ginger in lots of things
Gingerbread cookies – also vegan and gluten free!
Gingerbread granola – the perfect seasonal breakfast bowl topper!
Gingerbread hot chocolate – warms you from your nose to your toes!
Chocolate gingerbread quinoa puffs – crunchy little bites of spiced chocolate heaven!
And coming soon – ginger chocolate and orange spice mini loaves and gingerbread pancakes. Because a ginger repertoire is incomplete without pancakes surely?!
What are your favourite seasonal bakes? Do you have any you keep going back to time after time? This ginger cake is a firm favourite in our house now. And I challenge any Christmas grinch to smell this baking and not start humming carols quietly to themselves 😉
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Ginger Cake
prep: 15 mins / cook: 45 mins / inactive: 0 mins / total: 60 mins / quantity: 16 squares
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup (40g) coconut oil
- 2 tblsp ground flax seeds
- 1 + 3/4 cups (250g) Hodmedods Organic Fava Bean Flour
- 1 tblsp ground ginger
- 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 1/4 cup (45g) crystalised ginger
- 2 ripe bananas – the spottier the better!
- 1/2 cup (90g) coconut sugar
- 1/2 cup (120ml) unsweetened almond milk
- 1 tsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 cup (45g) black treacle
Decoration:
- 3 tblsp icing sugar
- 2-3 tsp cold water
- 1/4 cup (45g) crystalised ginger
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 160 Fan / 180 C / 350 F / Gas 4 and line a 7 x 9 inch ( 18 x 23 cm) baking tin with parchment paper, covering the base and sides
- Melt the coconut oil in a small saucepan or in the microwave and set aside to cool
- In a small bowl or mug mix the ground flax seeds with 1/3 cup (80ml) cold water and set that to one side too
- In a large bowl put the flour, ginger, nutmeg, baking powder and baking soda
- If your crystalised ginger is in largeish chunks, cut into smaller pieces and add that to the large bowl
- Peel the bananas and break into chunks into a smaller bowl. Mash with a fork or potato masher - you want them to be well mashed to a puree
- Add the coconut sugar, almond milk, cider vinegar, treacle, flax seed mixture and melted oil and whisk together very well
- Pour this into the large bowl of dry ingredients and mix everything together with a rubber spatula, scraping up from the bottom of the bowl, making sure no pockets of flour remain
- Pour into your baking tin and cook for 45-50 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean
- Leave to cool in the tin for 10-15 minutes then carefully lift out onto a cooling rack
- Once the cake is completely cooled mix together the icing sugar and water to a runny paste. If it's too thin add a little more icing sugar, too thick add a little more water. When adding, less is definitely more, just add tiny increments at a time to get the right consistency. You want a paste that will drizzle but not one so liquid it doesn't hold its shape and just pools on the top of your cake!
- When you're happy with the icing simply use a teaspoon and drizzle/flick/splatter all over the top of the cake. Then sprinkle the pieces of crystalised ginger to top
- Leave the icing to set for a few minutes before slicing the cake into 16 squares (or less squares if you want larger portions for dessert!)
- Store in an airtight container
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4 Comments
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Hello there! I’m Sam, former Michelin star pastry chef and now your go-to vegan foodie on a mission to make plant-based eating a deliciously easy adventure! From cozy comfort foods to vibrant salads and decadent desserts, there’s something for everyone in my kitchen.
Whether you’re cooking for one or for a houseful I believe food doesn’t have to be complicated to be full of FLAVOUR and I want to show you how. I’ve been a rigorous meal planner for over a decade whilst embracing seasonal ingredients (because that’s where the real flavour is!)
I’m also a dedicated dog mum to Nooch and Baxter and enjoy cooking them homemade treats (many of which are posted here) when I’m not screaming at the tennis or devouring fantasy fiction.
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What would you substitute for the Fava beans?
Hi Mary Ann
The fava beans are in flour form rather than just beans so could easily be substituted with just normal plain flour. If you still need the cake to be gluten free then any gluten free flour would most likely also work.
Hope this helps! Let me know if you try any alternatives and how it turns out 🙂
~ Sam
I ground up chick peas into flour instead of the Fava and used them. I mixed the ginger bits into the mix and have not got as far as icing but it is disappearing fast! Thanks.
That’s great news, glad they’re being enjoyed!
I’ve used gram flour (or chickpea flour) before in savoury crackers but never ground the chickpeas myself! Do you have to dry them first?
Thanks for keeping in touch 🙂
~ Sam