Fiona McIntosh summer cookbook recipe: Triple ginger bar cake

This is cooked in a loaf tin and is flexible; delicious naked, slathered with butter, or more traditionally iced with a loose glace to become a perfect tea cake.

The Way to the Heart: Fiona McIntosh

Every day this summer, we’ll publish an exclusive recipe from a favourite Australian author, dishes made with affection for family, friends or someone special.

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Asking me for a favourite recipe is like turning me loose in a chocolate salon and saying choose one item.

However, distilling my preferences, I am a baker at heart, loving tarts, pies, cakes.

Considering those I make often – rather than those I road test out of interest or simply for a challenge – then a line-up of cakes emerge.

And of those, one that I truly enjoy making, that I bake regularly, and is devoured with outrageous greed by my family, is a triple ginger cake. Its flavour is coincidentally festive too, although I make it all year.

This is cooked in a loaf tin and is flexible; delicious naked, slathered with butter (and even toasted), or more traditionally iced with a loose glace to become a perfect tea cake.

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SUMMER COOKBOOK: THE WAY TO THE HEART

Minestrone (Mum’s vegetable soup)

This soup is a message of comfort via comfort food — delicious, nutritious, foolproof, cheap and feeds lots of people.

Tuna with pasta

Maybe I love this dish because it takes me back to when two pots and a black-and-white TV was enough, and there was nothing that could not fixed by a pint and a shared laugh.

Made-in-Minutes Goan Prawn Curry with Spinach

I love curries and this one is simple, with lots of flavour and a wonderful, creamy, coconut base.

Monster mash

My mash consistently makes women moan and gentlemen raise their eyebrows. The secret is simple muscularity.

Slow-cooked rabbit

A couple of decades ago I started to collect rabbit recipes from here and across the world, and ended up with hundreds.

Sri Lankan omelette

This is my favourite meal in the whole world. In particular, Sri Lankan omelette is my go-to comfort food. I can make it quickly and eat it three times a day.

My Humble Pie is the greatest to exit an oven

It may be humble in terms of cost, but it is bold, brash, punchy and delectable with a Stroganoffish zest. It will change your life. Humbly.

Raspberry and elderflower trifle

This dish tells a story of my life. I grew up eating custard, real custard made from cornflour and eggs and milk, along with fools and flummeries.

A roast chicken comfort dish

I love the way the roasting smell fills the house. It reminds me of so many wonderful family dinners.

Beef keema

What I love about keema is how forgiving it is and how easy it is to make. This is the homely dish that introduced my children to their Pakistani side.

Triple ginger bar cake

This is cooked in a loaf tin and is flexible; delicious naked, slathered with butter, or more traditionally iced with a loose glace to become a perfect tea cake.

Peter Craven’s Duck a l’orange

Any kind of duck is grand but duck as the French do it, and especially duck a l’orange, is a joy forever.

Selvie’s chicken curry with curry leaves

When our spice couriers managed to get their contraband through customs, there was much celebrating – usually in the form of Mum’s ­fragrant chicken curry.

Ice cream with caramel and cherries

And then the dessert comes... It slides into that part of our experience that is pre-politics, pre-speciality, pre-peculiarity and even pre-sophistication.

Lamb scrag end neck chops stew

This is the meal I constantly cook because my husband will live on it quite happily for a week, saving me a lot of bother ... he is not a modern man.

Creme brulee with candied rhubarb

More than 30 years ago, I gave a formal sit-down dinner party for 30 people. Dessert was the piece de resistance, individual creme brulees with candied rhubarb.

Borsch for the busy person

With the right mix of ingredients, borsch is a tangy but sweet and belly warming mouthful of delight.

Virginia Woolf Brittle

The impact of Virginia Woolf Brittle on a current partner or potential mate, particularly when fed by hand and in combination with a reading in the late sun, cannot be overstated.

Wakame beurre blanc

This sauce has become such a staple that I douse all grilled, poached, or pan-fried seafood in it at all times of the year.

Lemon Chicken

When our children were growing and my wife Steph was teaching evening classes, lemon chicken was the go to meal – simple and tasty.

Crispy Latkes

Creamy mashed, crispy smashed, jacket roasted and anointed with butter, pan fried with sliced onions, deep-fried to limpness, over-salted and wrapped in newsprint – however they come, I love potatoes.

Lamb Moussaka Therapy

Imagine a dish as therapeutic to eat as a lasagne, but instead of beef it’s made with lamb and has layers of potato and eggplant as the pasta sheets … Imagine no more, champions!

Odd couple share recipe for great summer reading

They’re one of the less likely duos to be found discussing the filleting of trout or basting of chicken – but Tom Keneally and Nat’s What I Reckon have all bases covered.

Summer Cookbook

Australia’s favourite authors share their most meaningful recipes.

 

 

Cake

100g unsalted butter

100g dark muscovado sugar

175g self-raising flour, sifted

4 generous teaspoons ground ginger

175g golden syrup

A good splodge of ginger wine if you’re in the mood (2-3 tablespoons)

2 extra large free-range eggs, beaten

2.5cm fresh ginger, peeled and finely grated

150g naked or crystallised ginger, chopped (flour a little to help even distribution)

If you have stem ginger in your pantry, chop up a little and throw that in too.

Icing

75g icing sugar

More ginger wine or fresh lemon juice

 

1. Preheat the oven to 160C and line a 23cm loaf tin. You can buy liners now that are a joy to use. Invest in some – you’ll never look back for loaf cakes.

2. Sift the flour and ground ginger into a bowl.

3. In a stand mixer bowl, or in a separate bowl with a hand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar with a pinch of salt until fluffy.

4. Pour in the golden syrup and wine. Mix to combine. Beat in the eggs, a little at a time, then gradually add the flour and ginger mix.

5. Finally, stir through the fresh, stem and candied ginger.

6. Spoon into the loaf tin. Level the top and bake for about 50 to 60 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Every oven is different so this timing works for my oven. Start checking from around 50 mins.

7. When cooked, remove from the oven and allow to cool in the tin. It may sink a little if the ginger hasn’t distributed evenly but it makes no difference, especially if you’re going to ice it.

8. When it’s completely cool, devour. Or, when it’s completely cool, make the icing by mixing together the icing sugar and either a little ginger wine, or lemon juice, or water (go slowly with the liquid to reach your desired consistency).

9. Drizzle this over the top of the cake until it is just beginning to threaten to drip over the edge.

If I ice, I tend to decorate with a fresh flower like a white daisy but honestly it needs no embellishment.

People who claim they aren’t partial to ginger still seem to gorge on this cake. Happy baking!

Fiona McIntosh's Triple Ginger Cake

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Fiona McIntosh is an internationally bestselling novelist for adults and children. She left a career in PR and marketing to become a full-time writer, roaming the world for her novels. She hosts a series of highly respected fiction masterclasses and lives in South Australia. Her most recent book is the historical drama, The Orphans.

The Orphans, by Fiona McIntosh, Michael Joseph.