Soft and Sticky Gingerbread (2024)

This is just the kind of gingerbread you crave whendinnertime has suddenly become pitch-black and cold, as it now has, and youfeel like it’s midnight all the time and like you’re up in Scotland drinkingwhiskey from the bottle and waiting for spring. It’s big, soft, and comforting,like the down comforter of the cake world, and it fills your house with thespicy, delicious smell of holiday baking, even on a regular old school night.Plus, it will take you no more than 10 minutes to get it into the oven, promise.Or, as we say to the kids when we are quite sure about something but don’t wantto get into it later, if there is, say, a surprise hurricane or earthquake, I almost promise.

The recipe is hand-written in my recipe binder, and when Iwas trying to figure out how properly to credit it, I naturally consulted mymother. “Is this your gingerbread?” I asked, and she said, “Oh, is it this?”and pulled out a recipe card titled “Mummy’s Gingerbread” that calls for, amongother things, treacle, and the mystifyingmeasurements ½ egg and also 1 gill milk. “I don’t think it’s that,”I said, “seeing as how my gill has been, er, missing since the middle of thenineteenth century.” Hmm. “Is it this?” And strangely, there it was—an ancientclipping from the Times, called “Edna’s Blueberry Gingerbread.” I have never inmy life added blueberries (I didn’t even write that part when I copied therecipe), but I suppose you could. But then it would go from a big, comfortingcake to a more challenging cake studded with hot, puckery berries, which is notwhat I’m going for at all. Still, if you want to try adding “1 cup blueberries,lightly floured,” be my guest.

I was going to make a note here about how this is a greatway to get more iron into your diet, what with the legendary iron-containingproperties of molasses, but when I looked at my molasses bottle, I noticedthat, to achieve your daily requirement, you’d need to swallow 25 tablespoonsof it. If you’re anemic, try eating the whole pan of gingerbread all by yourself,and let me know if you feel a burst of energy afterwards (I’m being ironic. Ha ha.). But I will tell youthat Ben and I were talking over dinner about how your body actually needssmall quantities of various metals, which surprised and delighted him. “Wow,”he said. “If I died and youmelted me down, would there be enough copper in me to make even, like, a tiny,tiny dollhouse spoon?” Kill me.

Soft and Sticky Gingerbread

2 cups flour (I used half spelt)

½ teaspoon salt (I use one scant teaspoon of Kosher salt)

¼ teaspoon cloves

½ teaspoon cinnamon

¼ teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon ginger

1 cup boiling water

2 teaspoons baking soda

Heat the oven to 350, and butter and flour a lasagna-sized(10 by 14 inch) baking pan.

Now, in the bowl of an electric mixer, creamtogether the butter and sugar until it’s light and fluffy, then add the eggsone at a time, followed by the molasses. Take a moment to stop the mixer andscrape the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula to make sure there’s nobutter hiding out down there. Meanwhile, sift together the flour, spices, andsalt (and by “sift together” I mean, of course, whisk together, because I’m lazy like that), then mix them into thebatter until they just disappear.

Now measure the boiling water (I do thisright in the dirty molasses cup), add the baking soda to it, call your kidsover to see the amazingly foaming mixture, explain the science of it (eachcrystal of baking soda actually contains a tiny, burping angel), and beat itgently into the batter, which will now seem incredibly runny, which is fine.

Pour it into your prepared pan and bake for about 30 minutes, until the cake isstarting to pull away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick comes out cleanor with crumbs on it, rather than ooky batter still. Serve with whipped cream,if you have company, or plain. Yum.