Gluten-Free Gingerbread Cake
By America's Test KitchenPublished on May 23, 2019
Time
1¼ hours, plus 1½ hours cooling and 20 minutes drying
Yield
Serves 12
Ingredients
Cake
1¼ cups sour cream 4 large eggs ⅔ cup molasses 3½ ounces (½ cup packed) light brown sugar 3½ ounces (99 grams/½ cup) granulated sugar ⅓ cup vegetable oil 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger 13 ounces (369 grams; 2¾ cups plus 2 tablespoons) America's Test Kitchen All-Purpose Gluten-Free Flour Blend 4 teaspoons baking powder 1 tablespoon ground ginger ¾ teaspoon baking soda ½ teaspoon salt ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon ⅛ teaspoon pepperGlaze
4 ounces (113 grams/1 cup) confectioners' sugar 5 teaspoons water 1 tablespoon maple syrup Pinch saltInstructions
- For the cake: Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 16-cup tube pan.
- Whisk sour cream, eggs, molasses, brown sugar, granulated sugar, oil, and fresh ginger together in bowl until combined. In large bowl, whisk flour blend, baking powder, ground ginger, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and pepper together. Whisk sour cream mixture into flour blend mixture until batter is thoroughly combined and smooth.
- Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top. Bake until top of cake is just firm to touch and skewer inserted into center comes out clean, 45 to 50 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking. Let cake cool in pan on wire rack, about 11/2 hours. Run thin knife around edge of cake to loosen, then remove cake from pan and return it to wire rack.
- For the glaze: Whisk all ingredients together until smooth. Pour glaze evenly over top of cooled cake. Let glaze set for 20 minutes before serving. (Cake can be wrapped in plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for up to 2 days.)
Time
1¼ hours, plus 1½ hours cooling and 20 minutes dryingYield
Serves 12Ingredients
Cake
Glaze
Test Kitchen Techniques
Ingredients
Cake
Glaze
Test Kitchen Techniques
Ingredients
Cake
Glaze
Test Kitchen Techniques
Why This Recipe Works
Employing both ground ginger and grated fresh ginger as well as cinnamon and black pepper ensured that our gluten-free gingerbread cake had sufficient punch. Most recipes rely on molasses as well as brown and granulated sugars, and we saw no reason to depart from tradition. Melted butter imparted a greasy texture, so we switched to vegetable oil supplemented with a significant helping of sour cream (1¼ cups), as we had done in other cake recipes. During testing, the center of the cake occasionally collapsed. Up to this point, we had been scraping the batter into a large rectangular baking pan. Would switching to a tube pan (which heats from the outside as well as the center hole) help? As we hoped, the cake rose better (and there was no longer a center that could sink), but the texture was still heavy and dense. Adding more eggs (four in total) upped the protein content and ensured a better rise, as did using a lot of baking powder (4 teaspoons) as well as ¾ teaspoon of baking soda. The switch to the tube pan made us reconsider our original unwillingness to frost this cake. Yes, a dusting of confectioners’ sugar would be a sufficient finish, but mixing that sugar with maple syrup (plus a little water and a pinch of salt) was just as easy and so much better. The glaze dribbled down the sides of this statuesque cake, adding both drama and yet another layer of flavor.
Instructions
- For the cake: Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 16-cup tube pan.
- Whisk sour cream, eggs, molasses, brown sugar, granulated sugar, oil, and fresh ginger together in bowl until combined. In large bowl, whisk flour blend, baking powder, ground ginger, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and pepper together. Whisk sour cream mixture into flour blend mixture until batter is thoroughly combined and smooth.
- Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top. Bake until top of cake is just firm to touch and skewer inserted into center comes out clean, 45 to 50 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking. Let cake cool in pan on wire rack, about 11/2 hours. Run thin knife around edge of cake to loosen, then remove cake from pan and return it to wire rack.
- For the glaze: Whisk all ingredients together until smooth. Pour glaze evenly over top of cooled cake. Let glaze set for 20 minutes before serving. (Cake can be wrapped in plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for up to 2 days.)
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