I have a Hanzel and Grettel thing going on today!  Gingerbread house cake coming up!  And that makes me think of Engelbert Humperdink – I was in my mid 30s before I realised that the opera wasn’t composed by the Tom Jones/Liberace cross balladeer.

I’m using up stuff in order to make room in the fridge and cupboards for my Christmas food shopping and it’s so cold, I needed to add ginger to warm me up!  Also, I bought this cake tin several years ago and haven’t got round to using it before.   I think I must have seen it on a cookery show – you can get them from Amazon or Ebay.

I’ve not been overly generous with the ginger as I know my family don’t like it to be too strong – if I were making it for me alone, I’d probably add another teaspoon of dried ginger at least, possibly two.

I probably should have used plain flour but I didn’t have any and as I was using dark brown sugar and that can make cakes quite heavy, I felt I still needed the baking powder and soda.  The cider vinegar really cuts through and keeps the sponge light as does the buttermilk.  If I’d had it I would have probably used half molasses sugar or dark muscovado too.

Ingredients

100g butter

100g margarine (Stork)

200g dark soft brown sugar

2 large eggs

50ml golden syrup

2 tspn ground ginger

2 tspn cinnamon

2 tspn mixed spice

200g self-raising sponge flour

100ml buttermilk

½ tspn baking soda

2 tspn baking powder

1 tspn cider vinegar

1 tblspn icing sugar for dusting

Method

• Preheat your oven to 160C fan and spray your bundt pan with oil
• Melt the butter, margarine, golden syrup and sugar together in a pan over a low heat, then remove from the heat and cool in a pan of cold water, being careful not to splash water into the mix
• sift together all the remaining dry ingredients into a large batter jug
• lightly beat the eggs
• whisk the buttermilk and vinegar into the cooled mix and then whisk in the eggs
• working very quickly, whisk the wet mix into the dry (you will notice the baking soda reacting with the wet ingredients and the mixture starting to bubble and rise)
• As soon as the mixture is combined pour it into your prepared bundt tin and bake for 45 minutes when a skewer should come away clean
• Cool in the pan for 30 minutes and then gently coax the cake away from the centre tube and sides.
• Invert the pan onto a board and the cake should slide out easily.
• Let the cake cool fully for another 20 minutes and then dust with icing sugar for a snowy effect.