Easy recipe for a delicious, moist, fruity Ginger Cake, perfect on its own or with vanilla ice cream.
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
Table of contents
My father in law, Michael, celebrated his 77th birthday last week and when asked what sort of cake he’d like, he had some pretty clear ideas about what was going into that cake tin! Let me see, he wanted it moist, dense, fruity and definitely gingery! To him, if it hasn’t got ginger, it’s not good enough!
This is what we came up with, a moist, dense, very gingery cake, with enough baking powder to give it just a hint of bounce. You can vary the amount of fruit and ginger slightly without affecting the final result and most certainly the type of fruit and ginger.
Handy Hints for getting the best out of this Ginger Cake
Ginger – when baking with ginger, to me, nothing compares to the sweet and spicy that stem ginger in syrup adds to the flavour profile. Chop the ginger up into your desired size, I placed them in a copper and went for fine for a more homogenous flavour. Use the syrup as part of the liquid the recipe calls for or at the very least, use it to glaze after baking. I’ve also used ground ginger powder here and didn’t bother with any fresh.
Fruit – your choice, I’ve gone for a medley, a standard mixed fruit combination of raisins, sultanas & citrus, like minced meat ingredient. It was a delicious cake, just the right amount of sweet and especially great eaten warm with some vanilla ice cream.
For more sweet delights, head on over to my Desserts page.
Now, let’s get our aprons on!
If you like the recipe, don’t forget to leave me a comment and that all important, 5-star rating! Thank you!
And if you make the recipe, share it on any platform and tag me @azlinbloor, and hashtag it #linsfood.
Lin xx
Michael’s Ginger Cake
Equipment
- a 22cm (9 in) cake pan
Ingredients
- 250 g plain flour
- 2 tsp ground ginger
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 3 large eggs
- 200 g light brown sugar
- 200 g white sugar
- 150 g salted butter melted
- 50 ml stem ginger syrup x 2 (one for glazing)
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 150 g stem ginger chopped up
- 100 g desiccated coconut plain, additive free, unsweetened
- 100 g mixed fruit
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180˚C (350˚F / 160°C Fan).
- Line and grease a 22cm (9 in) cake pan.
- Mix the flour, ground ginger and baking powder in a large bowl and set aside.250 g plain flour, 2 tsp ground ginger, 2 tsp baking powder
- Beat the eggs on medium speed for about a minute.3 large eggs
- Add the sugar and beat for another minute.200 g light brown sugar, 200 g white sugar
- With the beaters running, slowly add the butter, 50ml ginger syrup and vanilla and beat for 20 seconds or so, just to mix it up.150 g salted butter, 50 ml stem ginger syrup, 1 tsp vanilla
- Add the flour mix and fold it in or beat on the lowest speed until it’s all mixed in.
- Fold in or beat on the lowest speed the chopped up stem ginger, the mixed fruit and the desiccated coconut.150 g stem ginger, 100 g mixed fruit, 100 g desiccated coconut
- Pour into the prepared cake tin and bake for 50-60 minutes.
- Take it out of the oven and glaze it liberally with the stem ginger syrup. You could even make some tiny holes in the cake for the syrup to soak through.
- Leave to cool before serving on its own or with some ice cream or even custard, in which case, warm is lovely!
We love this cake – make it every year for my Dad’s birthday (102 this year!) It combines all his favourites in one cake: ginger, fruit and coconut. Contrary to previous comment, I don’t have a sweet tooth and don’t find this overly sweet.
Wow, 102! I’m so pleased to hear that you love this cake! We make it every year for my father in law too. He’s going to be 87 this year.
Sticky over sweet and weird! Coconut in a ginger cake was vile. Will not be making this again.
Shame you think so, it’s a huge favourite with family, friends and students. To each his own, eh?
Ginger cake is the best ever! The only thing is that I don’t get to make it enough but you’ve really inspired me to make it.
Thank you!