Ginger Cake - Quick and easy

 

yield: Makes 8 to 10 servings

active time: 15 minutes

total time: 2 hours

This dark, moist cake gets its deep flavor from blackstrap molasses, which may not sound appealing on its own but is wonderful in this cake.

Ingredients 

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 4 teaspoons ground ginger
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1 cup blackstrap molasses*
• 1 cup boiling-hot water
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 large eggs, lightly beaten

• Accompaniment: lightly sweetened whipped cream

Preparation

Preheat oven to 180ºC with oven rack in middle position. Butter a pan of around 22cm.

Whisk together flour, ginger, and cinnamon in a medium bowl until blended.

Beat together butter and brown sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at high speed until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes.

Whisk together molasses and boiling water in another large bowl, then whisk in baking soda (mixture will bubble up and expand).

Add flour and molasses mixtures alternately to butter mixture in 3 batches, mixing at medium speed until incorporated. Beat in eggs until smooth. (Batter will be thin.)

Pour batter into springform pan and bake until a wooden pick or skewer inserted in center comes out clean, 55 to 65 minutes. Cool in pan on a rack 10 minutes, then remove side of pan and continue to cool cake on rack at least 30 minutes more. Serve warm.

Recipe found at http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Ginger-Cake-109041#ixzz1BRwiVPNp

 

"Ginger is a fiery root with rough beige skin and hard, juicy, pale yellow flesh"

A quote I found in the BBC archives

Portugal/Spain mit vater

November/December 2010 -  my re-introduction to surfing after 4 and half months on the couch in Zürich. Caught up with the Lipke brothers in Lagos, hung with Barron Von Rupp in Lisbon, then me and dad checked out a few galleries through Spain, and discussed the finer points of distraction on the long drive north.

Music - Laka-Koffe by Detektivbyran

Pixies - Cactus

I find other blogs much more interesting when there's music involved. I guess the only reason you'd visit a blog is if you have some interest in what the person has to say, so if you've made it this far you'll probably be interested to know I love the pixies right now, and this song in particular.

The Garden of Earthly Delights, 1503-1504 - Hieronymus Bosch

A day in the Prado art Museum with dad was way more interesting than I would have imagined, and I never would have bothered if my dad hadn't made it a priority. We waited for 1 hour in the rain outside but it was definitely worth it. The complexity of the imagination, and the vision of men, living 500 years ago in a deeply stratified and religious Europe was really amazing to see.

Reading the signs

Saw a dying bird with a fishing line hanging from its mouth today. Me and my dad were surfing the south coast of Portugal and it just floated past looking… sad. We thought about paddling over and seeing if we could help it out, but we were both too scared that it might bite us, or give us a disease, or struggle and be afraid or whatever. So we just watched it float past between sets.

Not too sure what this means. My dad thinks the worlds a more interesting place if things like that happen for a reason. I agree, but not in a serious way. 

Personally I like to find symbols and metaphors in things. For example in the Algarve (south west corner of Portugal) you see a lot of those big, California style palm trees. I’m not too enthusiastic about canary island date Palms (I found the name on the net), but occasionally around here you see dead ones, they’re just as big and grand, usually with all their leaves intact, but brown instead of green.

In some ways it’s a perfect metaphor for the current state of economical affairs in this country, but the reason I feel so sober and interested as I drive past a canary island date palm on the south coast highway, is because this palm is used as a symbol of wealth and prosperity, and represents a dream. So to see a dead one, especially one standing in front of a decaying, old Portuguese style villa, strikes me as being a dream lost (failed, eradicated). I’ve been trying really hard to keep my own struggling canary island date palm alive, so I guess that’s why it sits with me as being such a powerful image.