Rose Prince chooses Constance Spry’s Belvoir Ginger Cake as one of her greatest recipes ever.
‘A recipe that I have known since childhood, and the best, stickiest, darkest cake that just gets better and better stored in the tin’
Belvoir Ginger Cake
Extract from The Constance Spry Cookery Book
Constance Spry & Rosemary Hume
First published in 1956 by J. M. Dent & Sons
This must be made at least a day or two before required.
Ingredients
4oz butter
4oz brown sugar
4oz sultanas
10oz (or a breakfast cup) black treacle
1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 eggs
½lb plain flour
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
2-3 tablespoons milk
A few blanched split almonds or 1 piece of stem ginger drained from syrup and sliced
Method
Cream butter, add sugar, cream again thoroughly. Then add fruit, treacle, ginger and the eggs one at a time with about half of the flour.
Mix thoroughly. Add remaining flour with the soda warmed in the milk. Turn at once into a papered, greased, and floured 8in tin. Bake in a slow oven for about an hour or more.
When two-thirds baked, scatter the top of the cake with preserved ginger or almonds. Finish baking.
This cake is excellent for picnics eaten with a wedge of cheese, Cumberland fashion.
