Old Fashioned Gingerbread Cake with Brown Sugar Glaze

Make this  Old Fashioned Gingerbread Cake Recipe with a Rich Brown Sugar Caramel Glaze.  This is a vintage cake that is served warm topped with a homemade brown sugar caramel glaze.   We believe the caramel glaze is a must! 

This rich old fashioned gingerbread cake is comfort food from times past.    It fills my soul with smells and memories of Grandmother’s warm kitchen.    It brings images of dusted flour countertops and all the smells of gingerbread from my childhood.    We are hoping this gingerbread cake will delight you and your family as it does ours.   And it absolutely must be served with the warm caramel glaze!  You sure do not wish to skip that, I promise you. 

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This recipe is not mine, it is from a young lady that I have just recently discovered, Jill Winger.   She impressed me the moment I heard her speak.   Jill lives on a 67-acre prairie homestead with her husband and three adorable children.   Her hubby and she have made the giant leap to “leave the herd and grow their homestead dreams”.       She teaches all things homesteading and cooking from scratch through her blog, the Prairie Homestead and her online cooking courses.   She also shares tips on all things homesteading such as how to grow a garden and how to keep chickens      I believe she has exceeded her initial goal of growing food for her family, she has become not only a mentor of mine but others on old fashioned skills, homesteading and cooking. 

Scroll down for the Printable Recipe

I was lucky enough to find her just prior to her amazing cookbook debut.    And then I immediately bought a copy for myself and then later for all my daughters.   It was one of the best I have seen in years,  it’s a hardcover book titled, “The Prairie Homestead Cookbook, simple recipes for heritage cooking in any kitchen” that ABSOLUTELY needs to be in your kitchen.    

Quickly before we get back to her amazing Gingerbread cake recipe, I wish to tell you about her online cooking courses. 

• Learn how to cook like a Homesteader with the Heritage Crash Cooking Course
• Canning Made Easy

 Shiny jars of home-canned jam. Crusty loaves of warm bread fresh from the oven. Golden yellow sweet cream butter. It all sounds so lovely. And quaint. And old-fashioned, doesn’t it?

In our fast-paced, automated society, it’s easy to think of the kitchen arts of years past as out-of-date and irrelevant. After all, we have microwaves, superstores, and restaurants on every corner– why should anyone care about learning how to make gravy. Or bake a loaf of bread. Or can a jar of green beans? 

Friends, I’m here to tell you that old-fashioned doesn’t have to mean out of style. Because no matter how technology-savvy we become, food is a timeless part of the human experience and there’s nothing more grounding than cooking a meal with fresh ingredients. 

The problem is that we’ve completely lost touch with how food gets to our plates. We’ve allowed massive corporations to tell us cooking is hard. And boring. And an unnecessary evil. (And that we should just buy their just-add-water meal or TV dinner instead, right?) 

But here’s the deal: cooking is not hard! And making delicious, nourishing food for people we love isn’t drudgery, not to mention, food that you cook at home will almost always be more nourishing than anything prepared in a factory. 

Our cultural knowledge of how to make good meals in the kitchen has been eroding over the last few generations with the advent of convenience foods. It’s time to bring resourcefulness back to our kitchens, and this course is your ticket. 

My friend Jill Winger, an experienced homesteader and home cook, has taken the best of these “heritage kitchen arts” and has condensed them into simple DIY cooking tutorial videos. 

If you’ve ever felt the urge to learn how to bake sourdough bread, ferment your own veggies, or can that farmer’s market bounty but haven’t known where to start, you will LOVE this! 

Here’s a Sneak Peek of What You’ll Learn in These Videos: 

• How to (SAFELY) Can Veggies, Broth, and Even MEAT in a Pressure Canner
• How to Cure Your Own Ham and Summer Sausage (and what you need to know about nitrates/nitrites)
• A Non-Fussy “Homestead Sourdough” Bread Technique that Yields Gorgeous, Crusty Loaves
• How to Make Melt-In-Your-Mouth Mozzarella Cheese in 30-Minutes or Less!
• How to Use Salt and Water to Transform Garden Veggies into Probiotic-Packed Goodness
• Trusted (Simple) Recipes for From-Scratch Brown Gravy, DIY Powdered Sugar, and 10-Minute Enchilada Sauce

So hop over Jill’s Information page to check it out, think it over, and I hope you join me on this revolutionary movement to take back our kitchens and get back to the way food was meant to be.

Now for Jill’s amazing cake recipe:

How to Make an Old Fashioned Gingerbread Cake:

Scroll down for the Printable Recipe

This cake recipe has all the smells and tastes of homemade gingerbread but since it’s baked in a 9-inch square pan, it’s so much easier.   

Ingredients for old fashioned gingerbread cake:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 1/2 cup brown sugar (packed) preferable organic whole cane sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup hot water 100 degrees F
• 1/4 cup molasses

Start your gingerbread cake by greasing a 9-inch square cake pan and preheating oven to 350 degrees F.     Then in a large bowl, add flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, and salt then blend well.   

In another mixing bowl add melted butter, sugar, and eggs and whip.    Then add in the hot water and molasses and continue to whip until very well combined. 

Pour the molasses mixture into the dry ingredients and gently stir until just combined.  

Spread into your prepared 9-inch square pan and place in your preheated oven for 40 minutes until a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.   

Remove from the oven and place on a rack to cool slightly.   Then cut and serve with the caramel glaze below. 

How to Make Caramel Glaze:

Ingredients needed:

• 1/2 cup of Brown Sugar, (packed) preferably organic whole cane sugar
• 1 Tbsp Organic Corn Starch
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• 1 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla extract 

In a small saucepan over medium heat, whisk together the sugar and cornstarch.

Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the vanilla and serve by drizzling over the cake while still warm. 

If the Caramel Glaze is not served immediately it can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days.  And to reheat, warm in a small saucepan over medium heat until heated through. 

Drizzle the caramel glaze over the still-warm gingerbread cake and serve it immediately.  This Gingerbread Cake with caramel glaze is something we know you will serve over and over again as we did.  

If you enjoyed this Gingerbread Cake with Caramel Glaze then try:

1. Peppermint Christmas Candy Cane Chewy Cookies
2. Spiked Bailey’s Fudge
3. Old Fashioned Appalachian Apple Stack Cake

Print Recipe

5 from 7 votes

Old Fashioned Gingerbread Cake with Caramel Glaze

Make this  Old Fashioned Gingerbread Cake Recipe with a Rich Brown Sugar Caramel Glaze.  This is a vintage cake that is served warm topped with homemade brown sugar caramel glaze.

Prep Time10 mins

Cook Time40 mins

Total Time50 mins

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Keyword: Caramel Glaze, Gingerbread Cake, Old Fashioned Caramel Glaze, Old Fashioned Gingerbread Cake

Servings: 9

Calories: 378kcal

Author: Evelyn

Ingredients

For the Cake

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter melted
• 1/2 cup brown sugar (packed) preferably organic whole cane sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup hot water 100 degrees F
• 1/4 cup molasses

For the Glaze

• 1/2 cup brown sugar (packed) . preferably organic whole cane sugar
• 1 tbsp Organic Corn Starch
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• 1 tbsp unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla extract

Instructions

For the Cake

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9-inch square pan
• In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon and, salt.
• In a separate bowl, mix the butter, sugar, and eggs until well combined, then whisk in the hot water and molasses.
• Add the molasses mixture to the dry ingredients and stir until just combined.
• Pour the batter into the prepared pan and place in the preheated oven. Bake for 40 minutes until a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
• While the cake is cooking make the caramel glaze (below)
• Remove from oven and serve warm with the caramel glaze drizzled over the top.

For the Glaze

• In a small saucepan over medium heat, whisk together the sugar and cornstarch, then stir in 1/4 cup of water and whisk until smooth.
• Add the cream and butter and cook until the sauce is thickened and bubbly. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the vanilla.
• Drizzle over the still-warm gingerbread cake and serve it immediately.

Notes

The Gingerbread will keep, tightly covered, in the refrigerator for up to 2 days.

If the Caramel Glaze is not served immediately it can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days.  To reheat, warm in a small saucepan over medium heat until heated through.  

Nutrition

Calories: 378kcal | Carbohydrates: 54g | Protein: 5g | Fat: 16g | Saturated Fat: 10g | Cholesterol: 89mg | Sodium: 285mg | Potassium: 228mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 31g | Vitamin A: 552IU | Calcium: 62mg | Iron: 2mg