The Best Gingerbread

I have one thing to say to you: make this bread. It will immediately put you in the mood for fall and it’s so moist and delicious. I was craving gingerbread and it’s not easy to find a good recipe since most are for cookies or cakes. I wanted more of a breakfast bread or snack bread so I adapted a few recipes until I was happy with the result. I am very happy.

I bumped up the nutrition by decreasing the amount of sugar in the recipe and using my whole wheat pastry flour again…I’ll have to say it was a success. Remember when I mentioned whole wheat pastry flour back in this post? It can be a little hard to find depending on where you live. You can always substitute all-purpose flour, but regular ol’ whole wheat will be a little heavy for this recipe. I use this pastry flour in the majority of baking and it’s great. I found this nifty explanation online about the difference between WW pastry flour and regular WW flour- the whole wheat pastry flour has a higher starch and lower gluten content than regular whole wheat flour. It offers less structure for your product, but will give you a more tender result.

This bread reminds me of the gingerbread I used to eat at Souper Salads. Anyone know what I’m talking about? I always loved going there as a kid and loved eating endless amounts of gingerbread. Just looking at these pictures makes me want this bread. Luckily I made some yesterday. It is the perfect bite of fall.

One more thing, don’t be alarmed when you boil the applesauce and add the baking soda and molasses, the mixture will fizz and bubble like some strange science experiment. This is supposed to happen and if I went to culinary school perhaps I could explain why. I can’t. All I know is the first time I made the gingerbread I tried to take the easy way out and just dumped those ingredients into the bowl and the bread turned out flat and dense. Go figure.

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Gingerbread

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup molasses
1 teaspoon baking soda

DRY:
1 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt

WET:

2 eggs
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line bottom of 8×8 dish with parchment or wax paper. Spray the sides of the baking dish with cooking spray.
2. Sift together dry ingredients. In a small saucepan, bring applesauce to a boil. Remove from heat, add molasses and baking soda. The mixture will foam and bubble vigorously. Set aside to cool off a little.
3. In a large bowl, beat eggs with sugar on medium speed until light yellow and mixture thickens, about 3 minutes. Add in oil on low speed until combined.
4. Add flour mixture in three parts, alternating with applesauce mixture in two parts to the wet ingredients until combined. Pour into prepared 8×8 dish. Bake 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

Source: adapted from Joy of Cooking and other online recipes

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