Ginger Shortcake

I’ve already posted my favourite Ginger Nut recipe, so when I found a Ginger Shortcake recipe in one of my books, I knew I had to try it.

Now, the recipe said to bake the base for an hour.  A whole hour.  Granted, the temperature isn’t set too high, but an hour seemed rather long to me, so I decided to start checking it after 30 minutes or so and take it from there.  And I’m glad I did.  The shortcake was starting to darken after 30 minutes and had I baked it for the full hour, I dread to think what colour it would have been.  In the end it was a little crisper around the edges and softer in the middle, which I preferred.

The base doesn’t have just as much of a ginger kick as the topping so if you’re a fan then feel free to increase the ginger.  I’d recommend a generous, rounded teaspoon.

And these pass the (all important) Little Miss Traybakes test!  Thumbs up from the preschooler!

Ingredients

Base

5oz/140g butter

8oz/225g plain flour

3 tsp baking powder

1 tsp ground ginger

4oz/110g brown sugar

pinch of salt

Icing

1 tbsp golden syrup

1 tsp ground ginger

2oz/55g butter

3oz/85g icing sugar (powdered sugar)

1.  Melt the butter and add the sugar.  Mix together and pour over the sifted flour, ginger, salt and baking powder.  Spread over your tin (I used my 8inch/20cm square tin). Bake for 30-35 minutes at 320F/160C.

2.  Leave the base to cool.  To make the icing, melt all the icing ingredients together.  Do not let it boil.  Spread over the cooled shortcake and leave to set.

3.  Cut into slices, squares, whatever shapes you want!