Sticky Gingerbread
Why I Love This Recipe
This is my mum's recipe for sticky gingerbread (or Parkin, as it's known in the North of England). Gingerbread is found everywhere during Bonfire Night, and is a traditional cake to eat around that time.
We're not talking the gingerbread-house kind of stuff here - we're talking sticky, cake-like gingerbread. Moist and delicious, this keeps for several days in an air-tight container, and in fact gets better with time - if you're baking it for an occasion, it's best to bake it two days beforehand and let it sit in its container til you need it.
Ingredients You'll Need
8oz butter
8oz dark brown sugar
8oz black treacle (Lyle's is the best brand, or you could use Molasses, but it's not quite the same)
12oz plain flour
2 level dessertspoonsful ground ginger
2 beaten eggs
3 level tsps ground cinnamon
1/2 pt milk
2 level tsps bicarbonate of soda (I think in the US this would be called baking soda)
Directions
Grease a Roasting tin (or I guess a Brownie tin would work great too)
In a pan, over a low-medium heat, melt the butter, sugar and treacle.
Sift the flour, ground ginger and cinnamon together in a bowl.
Stir the melted mixture into the flour and spice mix and then add the beaten eggs.
Warm the milk in the pan that you used for the butter etc until it's lukewarm.
Stir the bicarbonate of soda into the milk, then add it to the mixture.
Pour into the roasting tin (expect the mixture to be very liquid).
Bake at 140c (280f) for 1 hour.
Cover the top with kitchen foil or greaseproof paper and bake for a further 30 minutes.
Check on it regularly though, as my mum has a fan oven and cooks it for considerably less time than this (about 3/4 hour and 20 mins respectively).
When cooled (in it's tin), cut into squares and serve like you would serve brownies.