Name: Gingerbread Recipe
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 35 min
Total time: 45 min
Yield: 1
Cuisine: GBBO Inspired
Ingredients: 1 cup molasses; 5 Tablespoons butter; 1/2 cup boiling water; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 1/2 salt, more if you use unsalted butter; 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger; 2 cups flour

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Have you had Gingerbread from a real gingerbread recipe? Not a cookie, biscotti, house or latte but real honest to god Gingerbread Loaf?

Try this gingerbread recipe once and you’ll be converted.

It’s indeed something worth baking up just for the scent of it baking. Your house will be fragrant with the wafting scent of ginger and molasses even after it’s done baking

James Beard’s Gingerbread Recipe

I was going through the cookbook collection the other day deciding what to keep and what to toss. Low and behold, James Beard on Bread was on my shelf!

I bought it, yes, and now I was thinking about giving it away without a second glance, yes. NO! I’d had enough interest to buy the damn book, so I best look through it and see what piqued my interest enough to buy it.

Two minutes in I was curled up on the couch reading each recipe and remembering exactly why every James Beard book is a gem, the blurb. Every single entry has a perfect note above it; a thought a memory, some history or just comments on changing it up a little bit.

James Beard, master storyteller

This man was a master in the kitchen, but the real treasure for me is always his little bits of storytelling, he must have been a real character in real life.

I found no less than five recipes I wanted to make right off the bat. I started off with Cream Biscuits and WOW they are something. And now here’s real Gingerbread Cake which Mr. Beard assures us is a cake best served while warm, sliced thin and buttered.

Sometimes referred to as Gingerbread Loaf Or Gingerbread Cake

It is like a cake but baked in a loaf pan. And sliced. So cake or loaf, it all works! I like the fact that you can slice because it makes for an easy way to send it in lunches.

The warm loaf was tested by hungry teachers who groaned and told me how their grandmother used to make something similar. Even when it was cold it was well-received at home as well.

It was hard to stop eating it and snap a picture while the light was still good, but I got one. Then I sliced the rest of the loaf, buttered it and got out of the way, these people, they’re ALWAYS hungry.

This is a great gift to make and give to friends. I included it in my Big List of Handmade Homemade Edible Food Gifts. Check it out if you like to make and give non-cluttering gifts.

Light or Dark Molasses for Gingerbread?

For this recipe either one will work! In general, I think either kind will work in most recipes. Keep in mind I haven’t tried most recipes. Dark molasses is just going to give more flavor overall.

1 loaf