Bake-a-thon 2016: Day 3
Theme: Naked Cakes
Recipe: English Ginger Cake
A ginger and star anise flavored cake that is perfect with evening tea. This yummy naked cake from Britain is super easy to make.
For this week I am posting Naked Cakes, ones that do not have any cream topping. I posted a Parsi Mawa Cake and here is the second cake. This cake is from Vikas Khanna's book Indian Harvest. I was reading the recipes from the book and this one caught my eye.
A cake flavored with ginger is definitely amazing. Adding the licorice flavors of star anise will further make the cake super. So I decided to make this one. In a jiffy, I got together all the ingredients and started making it. That is when I realized that the book does not talk of adding any sugar and star anise in the method. So based on other cake recipes that I have made, I added the two ingredientsin the recipe.
The cake turned out really good. The two distinct features I saw in the recipe is adding heavy cream in the batter and foaming of baking soda and vinegar before adding it to the batter. I have never made an eggless cake using heavy cream. The result was perfect and when served with steaming hot tea, it made a great tea time snack.
I made a small 6 inch cake and the moment it was out of the oven, I regretted not making a LARGER cake! Between the two of us, we devoured half the cake in under 30 minutes. The rest of the cake served as breakfast the next day. I have to make another batch of the cake really soon. Hopefully after I am done with teh bakes for this month, I shall make that again. Until then, hope you enjoy this one and come back for the next bake soon.
Ingredients
All purpose flour 2 cups
Unsalted Butter ½ cup, room temperature
Heavy Cream 1 ¼ cup
Sugar 1 cup
Ginger 2 inch piece, minced
Star Anise powder 1 tsp
Pistachios 1 cup, chopped
Baking Soda 1 tsp
Vinegar 1 tsp
Method
Preheat oven to 350 F/ 180 C. Line a 6 inch round mold with parchment paper and keep ready.
Sift flour and star anise powder. Mix in butter till the mixture is crumbly. Then add pistachios, ginger, sugar and heavy cream and mix till it is combined and soft.
In another mixing bowl add baking soda and vinegar. Whisk till it froths and then add it to the cake mixture. Beat till combined.
Transfer the cake mix to the baking pan and bake for an hour or so till a skewer inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan for a few minutes and transfer to a cooling rack.
Serve warm or cool. Sprinkle some powdered sugar on top. The cake tastes best topped with creme fraiche and with a side of Orange Pekoe Tea.
This is part of the Bake-a-thon 2016
Sharmila kingsly says
Ginger cakes are always a pleasure to have with Tea!! Nice one!!
Priya Suresh says
Ginger in cake, thats sounds awesome, cake looks fabulous.
Srivalli says
I love naked cakes too, especially the tea cakes..this one looks so inviting!...never used ginger before though have been planning to use..must try in this edition itself!
MySpicyKitchen says
Ginger cake sounds interesting. I like naked cakes for the fact that no more additional calories. Beautiful and yummy looking cake. Bookmarked!
Pavani says
Such a flavorful and spicy cake. Perfect fall and winter treat.
Priya Srinivasan - I Camp in My Kitchen says
Wow, ginger must have rendered a great zinggg to the cake, looks pretty!!
cookingwithsapana says
Ginger tastes nice in baked goodies. Nice cake.