thechristmasprojectdiary

I have started and launched today what I am deeming “The Gingerbread Trials.” There appear to be a number of recipes out there for gingerbread, and I thought it would be totally in keeping with this Christmas themed blog to carry out my very own gingerbread making, baking (and therefore eating) trials.

A year long Christmas project diary focused on things all Christmasy and a gingerbread recipe trial………………………the two just seem to have the most delicious potential to somewhat happily co-exist and be totally unquestionably linked, right?

On some level it indeed all makes very logical and makes very reasonable sense….. So here goes, the gingerbread trials have officially now begun also, and they are being launched alongside this very blog.

To launch this (hopefully) tasty component of my year long focus on all things pertaining to Christmas, I made the Edmonds’ Cookbook version of gingerbread today.

I have had my particular copy of the Edmonds’ Cookbook for many years and in it there is just one recipe for gingerbread (newer editions of this cookbook might have others).

It is something akin to a rite of passage being given or purchasing your very own Edmonds’ Cookbook here in Aotearoa New Zealand. It therefore seems rather fitting to start my gingerbread trials (and any other Christmas cooking I feel inclined to have a go at) with a gingerbread recipe, straight off the page of my own rather well leafed through copy of this classic Kiwiana cookbook.

Things however did not turn out as I had envisioned.

Perhaps had I read through the recipe in entirety before actually beginning, I may have picked up a little earlier (and therefore registered with greater clarity) that this particular recipe was not a gingerbread recipe like I had in fact thought it would be.

I was envisaging being able to make cute gingerbread folk. I had it fixed in my mind that I would be making gingerbread cookies, instead I was to discover at the point the instructions told me to pour (Mmmmmm…. it’s saying pour, and it does seem a lot more runny than I had thought it would be……) the mixture into a 20cm cake tin that I was in fact making a gingerbread cake, not gingerbread dough suitable for the cute cut-out gingerbread cookies percolating in my mind.

It was one of those experiences of thinking you were preparing and doing one thing, and then discovering part way through that things were indeed not actually what your mind was stating it was or would be.

It was most definitely cake.

Deliciously nice cake too.

It just took a bit of a mental shift on my part to register that it was indeed cake and not gingerbread suitable for gingerbread cookies, or even whimsical gingerbread houses, that I was in fact making.

There was a logical, rational reason soon to be most definitely discovered behind being told to pour the mixture instead of knead it into submission….. it was cake.

It was cake, and it was cake made absolutely and totally from must-pour-it-into-the-greased-cake-tin cake batter.

It was not cookie dough I was making on this occasion and I had to most definitely acknowledge the error in my thinking once all the ingredients were being mixed finally together.

I learnt a very important lesson about letting the mind fully register what the eye and hand were in fact reading and then working away at. Clearly, I was still somewhat tired from the year past and still not rested enough.

The verdict overall by those who got to taste it? Delicious and lovely.

Overall it was very palatable and yummy. We also highly recommend consuming it warm with vanilla ice cream served alongside to accompany it.

Warm custard may also be another very delicious alternative to have on hand, when consuming the resulting baked goodness obtained via this specific recipe.

We thoroughly enjoyed this particular ‘gingerbread’ and would bake it happily again…… there is no hesitation in stating that also.

We do however, have a valid excuse to seek out further gingerbread recipes, (particularly ones that do indeed lend themselves perfectly towards the use of gingerbread persons being cut out and gingerbread housing being constructed), because this first recipe was most clearly and definitely not the right one for that.

Gingerbread trials? They have just been launched.