Gingerbread Cake

My Thermomix take on Claudia Fleming's gingerbread cake — deeply spiced, impossibly moist, with a molasses backbone and a tender crumb that the TM6 mixes flawlessly every time.

Claudia Fleming's gingerbread cake is the kind of recipe that makes bakers weep with joy — dark, sticky, fragrant with ginger and molasses. The Thermomix handles the batter in one bowl, no creaming required, and the result is that perfect tender crumb that tastes like a winter afternoon.

Ingredients

• 🌾250 g plain flour
• 🫚2 tsp ground ginger
• 🌼1 tsp cinnamon
• 🥄½ tsp ground cloves
• 🥄½ tsp baking soda
• 🧂¼ tsp salt
• 🥄200 g molasses
• 💧150 g hot water
• 🍬100 g brown sugar
• 🧈80 g butter, cubed
• 🥚1 large egg
• 🫚30 g fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
• 🌾Butter and flour for the tin

Thermomix method

1. Preheat oven to 175°C (fan-forced 160°C). Butter and flour a 23 cm round cake tin.
2. Add the fresh ginger to the bowl and chop 10 sec / speed 8 until a fine paste forms.
3. Add the butter, molasses, brown sugar and hot water. Warm 3 min / 80°C / speed 3 until the butter melts and everything is smooth.
4. Add the egg and mix 10 sec / speed 4 until just combined.
5. Add the flour, ground ginger, cinnamon, cloves, baking soda and salt. Mix 20 sec / speed 4, scraping down once halfway through, until the batter is smooth with no dry patches.
6. Pour the batter into the prepared tin. Bake in a preheated oven 45 min / 175°C oven / no speed until a skewer comes out with just a few moist crumbs.
7. Cool in the tin for 15 min, then turn out onto a wire rack. Best served warm or at room temperature with a dusting of icing sugar or a dollop of cream.