Warm Gingerbread with Lemon Sauce

From the kitchen of One Perfect Bite...We're not hosting a Super Bowl party this year, but I've been asked to bring dessert to the one we're attending. The food being served is hearty, so I want to keep dessert as simple as possible with disappointing anyone. I've decided to do his and her cakes. Earlier this year I made Key Lime and White Chocolate Cake Squares. They proved to be one of my most popular recipes and I plan to make them for the gals this weekend. I decided to do gingerbread and lemon sauce for their husbands. I settled on an adaption of John Thorne's Moosehead Lake Gingerbread, a Maine hunting camp recipe that uses black pepper, dry mustard, and bacon grease. This is gingerbread with attitude. It's moist and fragrant and has rich color thanks to copious quantities of molasses, coffee and dark spices. You'll be glad to hear that bacon grease, while authentic and part of the original recipe, isn't used in this version. Back in the day, few guides had butter but they did have drippings and used them to cook and bake. The spices, mustard and black pepper were used to mask the flavor of the fat. I serve the gingerbread with lemon sauce because I love the pairing of those flavors. I suspect the lemon sauce never saw the light of day in the camps. The cake and the sauce are easy to do. I know that those of you who like strong flavors will love this. Here's the recipe.

Gingerbread with Lemon Sauce...from the kitchen of One Perfect Bite, inspired by John Thorne and Maida Heatter

Ingredients:
Gingerbread
3-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoons salt
1-1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2-1/4 teaspoons ground ginger
3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
3/4 teaspoon dry mustard
3/4 teaspoon black pepper
3/4 cup butter, room temperature
3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
3 eggs
1-1/2 cups dark molasses
2 tablespoons instant coffee
1-1/2 cups boiling water
Lemon Sauce
2 teaspoons lemon zest
1/2 cup lemon juice
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1-1/3 cups water
2 tablespoons butter

Directions:
1) To make gingerbread: Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Butter a 9 x 13-inch pan. Dust with fine dry breadcrumbs. Combine flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, mustard and pepper in a large bowl. Whisk to mix and lighten. Beat butter with brown sugar in the bowl of an electric stand mixer for 1 to 2 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add molasses and beat until smooth. Dissolve instant coffee in boiling water. With mixer on low speed, alternately add dry ingredients in three additions and coffee, which should be hot, in two additions. Begin and end with flour mixture. Beat only until smooth. Pour into prepared pan. Bake in center of oven for about 35 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Cool on a rack for 10 minutes. Invert cake onto another rack and remove pan. Invert again. Serve warm with lemon sauce. Yield: 16 servings.
2) To make lemon sauce: Whisk sugar and cornstarch in a 2-quart sauce pan. Add lemon juice, zest, water and butter. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring constantly. Boil for 1 minute. Serve warm. Yield: 2-1/2 cups.

Cook's Note: If you want your lemon sauce to be a vibrant yellow, add 1 or 2 egg yolks to the sauce after it has thickened. A drop of yellow food coloring can also be used.

This recipe is being linked to:
Designs By Gollum - Foodie Friday