hester's ginger loaf
rating:Preheat the oven to GM 2. Line a loaf tin.
In a saucepan, melt together 2-4 oz brown sugar, 6-8 oz syrup and/or treacle, and 3-4 oz butter or margerine.
When this has melted/dissolved, add 200ml milk and let it cool a little, then add 7 oz plain flour, a teaspoon of mied spice, a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda, 1-2 teaspoons of ginger (depending on how gingery you like it!), a good pinch of salt, and an egg. Mix well, trying to avoid getting "bubbles" of unmixed flour in it.
It will make a fairly runny batter. Pour this into your prepared tin (it doesn't have to be a loaf tin, actually, I'm just quite into laof cakes at the moment!), and bake for 75-90 minutes, or until it is firm and starting to crack on top, and set but not too dry in the middle; again, a skewer should come out a bit sticky, but without any raw cake mix on it.
Cool in the tin, and again, make a day or two in advance if possible. It will be lovely when fresh, but keeping it, wrapped, for a day or two allows it to become really damp and sticky.
If you wanted to posh it up a bit, you could probably put bits of crystallised ginger or lemon peel or something in it, but like the chocolate loaf, I'm a fan of its sticky, dense simplicity!
I did once make a chocolate loaf and a ginger one, and then turned them into a sort of battenburg, using a little cream cheese icing to stick the bits together. The texture of the two cakes is similar, and the dark chocolate and intense ginger (if you use the maximum amount of ginger!) go really well together.
