Berrycakeness

This did start out as a facebook status (since deleted), but I thought it may be too long winded to continue…hence placing it into a blog post.

I had planned to make gingerbread on Thursday night, except I didn’t do much of the planning. I got home late after a quick stop off at the bar and so chaos ensued. Enjoy.

Brain: Baking time! You have all the ingredients needed at home, no need to worry about getting home after the shops close. Don’t even think about it. You are Nigella.
Reality: BIG FAT NOPE. One VERY NECESSARY ingredient is missing and one less necessary but equally irritating ingredient is missing.. Nigella has been drinking.
Brain: Ok, we can do this. You have other things that can go in gingerbread to make it taste the same. GO GO GO! A bit of Jamie Oliver “making it up as you go along bish bash bosh”.
Reality: WTF is this. Why is it not like dough. Oh, gingerbread slop, why do you hate me. Turkey Twizzers FTW.
Brain: No problem! Pop it in the freezer. That will fix it.
Reality: After much sighing, the slop pile was squished into a small cavity in the bottom drawer.

20 minutes later

Brain: Should be ok now.
Reality: Hm. It’s going to be shit isn’t it. Throw it away and go to Sainsburys tomorrow.
Brain: You know better than to quit, shut the fuck up and cut out some damn shapes *does a little dance*.
Reality: Where the fuck is my unicorn cutter. Fuck.
More reality: Ok. Cats, ghosts and gingerbread childen it is. Fuck it, let’s throw in some stars.
Brain: Maybe if the stars are sharp enough, you could sell them as weaponry.
Reality: Rolly rolly, cutty cutty, bakey bakey.

10 minutes later

Reality: Well. Those are not gingerbread biscuits, and not finished baking. Back in you go.

2 minutes later

Reality: Some sort of hybrid biscuit cake is to be born tonight.
Brain: No income tax no VAT lalalala

Another 2 minutes later

Brain: This is the first batch and you’ve still not rolled out the second. What is wrong with you. And you’re still too scared to take the first batch out of the oven.

Reality: Out you go. Hm. Not sure what you are but you’re quite beautiful. Next batch will be 2mm rather than 6mm tall…

14 minutes later

Reality: Despite rolling out the dough thinner, the results are very much the same.
More reality: Ooh! I know where the unicorn cutter is! Huzzah! Unicorns!

2 more batches later

Brain: Ooh, well done. You can try to sleep now. Good luck with that *dances the stay awake until 4am because sleep is for suckers jig*

If you are interested in the recipe, it goes a little like this:

Follow a normal recipe such as this one, but forget to buy soft brown sugar. It’s very key to making gingerbread taste and look like gingerbread.

Your alternatives are:

Demerara sugar, treacle, golden syrup, milk, butter.

Or all 5 as I decided. You then need a shit ton more flour to stiffen it up (ooh matron), and then after a quick taste test, even more ginger.

For missing cinnamon, I used mixed spice. I have about 3 jars of the stuff to use so why not.

Instead of chilling in a fridge for 15 mins, I chose a freezer for 25 minutes.

I do not ice because I am too busy for liquid sugar. Apparently, Demerara sugar needs a slightly higher heat to melt and so the speckled affect is accidentally on purpose. Looks quite pretty really.

Happy Birthday Holly! Great pub choice and excellent company 🙂

Loves xoxo