Sticky Gingerbread Pudding with Toffee Sauce

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Merry Christmas! This is another guest post from my husband. For Christmas dinner, my husband usually makes a Christmas cake, which is a traditional English fruitcake. Christmas cake is vastly different from the fruitcake sold in American stores, with garishly colored candied fruits. He wanted to try something different this year and wanted to make a sticky toffee pudding.

Browsing recipes online, my husband came across this recipe for sticky toffee pudding that is a cross between gingerbread and a traditional pudding. He thought that this would be great for Christmas and so planned on making this. Since the recipe is from a British publication, he had to make some substitutions since we can’t necessarily get the same ingredients here. (Especially when you are basically snow-bound at home and can only get to the local shops.) The recipe called for stem ginger preserved in syrup and ginger wine. He substituted ginger preserves and pear wine instead. The recipe also called for self-rising flour, and he substituted cake flour, baking powder and baking soda for that.

The measures for this recipe were in grams and milliliters, which have been converted to ounces. The measurements may seem a little strange, as 150 grams converts to a very odd 5.3 ounces! Luckily we have a good digital scale. The pudding basin that we have is a little smaller than the 1.7 litre one that is specified in this recipe, but my husband just filled the basin until it was basically full and called it good. It doesn’t rise all that much, so as long as you leave about a quarter inch at the top you’ll be fine.

This was so good! You do have to serve it right away and doesn’t keep well at all. It still tasted like sticky toffee pudding, but the ginger was a great addition.

TOFFEE SAUCE
5.3 oz. brown sugar

3.5 oz. unsalted butter

3 tbsp ginger preserves
5 tbsp pear wine

GINGERBREAD PUDDING
1.5 oz. pecans, toasted and roughly chopped
6.2 oz. butter, softened
4.2 oz. brown sugar
3 eggs

1 heaped tsp grated gingerroot
2 tbsp ginger preserves
3.5 oz. chopped dates
6.2 oz. flour

1-1/2 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground ginger

½ tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp ground allspice

Butter a 1.7 litre (1.5 quart) pudding basin. The basin should have a lid if it is the plastic sort or you'll need to cover it with a sheet of buttered, pleated greaseproof paper covered with a sheet of foil, secured with string.

To make the toffee sauce, gently melt the sugar and butter in a saucepan until the sugar has dissolved. Increase the heat and whisk in the ginger preserves and pear wine, bring to a low boil and boil for one minute. Remove from the heat and set aside.

For the pudding, add the pecans to the pudding basin and spoon 3 tbsps of toffee sauce over. Beat the butter and brown sugar together until light and fluffy, add the eggs one by one, beating well between each addition, followed by the gingerroot, the ginger preserves and dates. Sift the flour and spices over and fold in. Spoon into the pudding basin. Cover and put in a large, lidded saucepan. Add enough boiling water to come halfway up the sides of the basin and put over a low heat. Cover and steam for 3 hours, topping the water up occasionally.

Remove the pudding basin from the saucepan and leave to cool for 5 minutes. Invert the pudding onto a serving plate. Reheat the sauce and serve with the pudding.

Adapted from BBC Good Food:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/8185/sticky-gingerbread-pudding-with-toffee-sauce