Mmmm…Gingerbread

12 Posted on December 12, 2011 - by Jules Shepard

Categories: All, Cakes, Desserts, Holiday, News, Recipes

Tags: , Allergy Friendly, Christmas, Cookie Swap, Dairy Free, Easy Holiday Recipes, GFCF, Gingerbread House, Vegan

If you know me or my recipes very well, you know that I absolutely love to bake, but that I can’t stand still long enough to make anything too awfully complicated or with too many ingredients! I’ve tried gingerbread several times and the one thing that kept me from publishing a recipe sooner was that it had so darn many ingredients! That’s the very reason I devised my all purpose flour — so that I and others living gluten free wouldn’t have to dart out to the store every time a recipe called for a new funky flour (only to be disappointed because it tasted funky too)!

Then one day it hit me. Why not use my Graham Cracker/Gingersnap Mix to make gingerbread? It seemed like it should be possible, and think how much easier it would be?! So I worked at it for awhile and even came up with a couple other ingredient alternatives so you could pick what suited your tastes and what was already in your cabinet! ; )

I’ve also given you the base ingredients if you want to make this recipe from scratch and don’t have my mix. I’m so happy with this recipe (I’d better be – I’ve made it a half dozen times in the past few weeks to get it just right!), and so very happy to share it with you this holiday season!

Happy holiday baking!

Gingerbread

Dry:

1 bag Jules Gluten Free™ Graham Cracker/Gingersnap Mix

OR this dry ingredient equivalent:

- 1 1/2 cups Jules Gluten Free All Purpose Flour
- 1/2 cup buckwheat or brown rice flour (Arrowhead Mills® Organic Buckwheat Flour)
- 1 cup fine white rice flour
- 1 cup brown sugar or coconut palm sugar
- 1 Tbs. baking powder, gluten-free
- 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
- dash of salt
Plus
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
1/2 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. ground ginger

Wet:

3/4 cup shortening (Earth Balance® Shortening Sticks or Coconut Oil)
1 1/4 cup pumpkin purée OR applesauce (“natural” applesauce is less sweet)
2 eggs or egg substitute
1/4 cup blackstrap molasses
1 tsp. vanilla extract, gluten-free

Preheat oven to 350 F (static) or 325 F (convection).

Cream dry ingredients with shortening. Add remaining wet ingredients and mix until fully integrated and light, 2-3 minutes.

Oil a 9 x 13 baking pan and scoop batter into the pan; smooth the top with a rubber spatula.

Bake in preheated oven 35 minutes, or until cake tester or skewer inserted into the center comes out nearly clean. Serve warm with whipped cream (or non-dairy version) or vanilla ice cream (dairy or non-dairy).

Serve fresh or wrap in parchment paper, then aluminum foil, and freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw at room temperature and cut into squares to serve.

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This entry was posted on Monday, December 12th, 2011 at 6:36 am and is filed under All, Cakes, Desserts, Holiday, News, Recipes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

12 Comments

We'd love to hear yours!

jennifer moore said: on November 30, 2010

Thanks so much for this! Gingerbread with peaches and whipped topping is a favorite treat from my childhood – one of the few “dessert” foods that qualified for breakfast in my home growing up!

- Jennifer
Reply
dee wilson said: on December 1, 2010

I was wondering what you thought about using this bread in a bread pudding? I would toast the bread but I wondered if it would not stand up well to milk?
Reply
- Jules said: on December 1, 2010
  
  I haven’t tried it in that application, but I can’t imagine it would be bad! If it tastes this good as a fresh, moist cake, then it would probably be delicious as bread pudding as well! Please let us all know how it turns out!
  Reply
dee wilson said: on December 1, 2010

Also can I freeze this bread? Thinking of eating some and then freezing the rest to make a bread pudding some Saturday in December. Thanks again.
Reply
- Jules said: on December 1, 2010
  
  Sure – that sounds like a great idea, actually!
  Reply
Candice said: on December 8, 2010

I am planning on making this recipe for Christmas. If I use coconut oil instead of shortening, should I melt the coconut oil before I use it, or keep it in its solid form?
Reply
- Jules said: on December 8, 2010
  
  Hi Candice – if you use coconut oil, keep it in its solid state (room temp) for this recipe. Great question!
  Reply
Annie said: on December 14, 2011

Home for the Holidays ROCKS!
I LOVE gingerbread, too.
Reply
Joey said: on December 17, 2011

Thought I had finished my Christmas baking, then remembered a package of your Graham Cracker/Gingersnap Mix.
Going to the kitchen right now!
Reply
- Jules said: on December 26, 2011
  
  Lucky find, Joey!!!
  Reply
Sue Meier said: on March 9, 2012

Can I make the gingerbread in muffin tins?
Reply
- Jules said: on March 10, 2012
  
  Yes! Sue, I’m sure it would be delicious that way, just keep checking the bake time – be sure not to over-bake them!
  Reply