Happy Accidents

There's a reason they call it Gingerbread and not Molasses-bread. But all too often you find a recipe with too much "edge" which comes from an overdose of black strap molasses.

As a happy accident (seemingly the story of my culinary experiences) I only had half the amount of molasses for this gingerbread. In its place I substituted honey, one of my current favorite flavors. The result is a super moist, milder cake, still redolent with spices, but not as bracing.

Honey-Gingerbread

1/2 cup milk

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Finely grated zest of 1 lemon

1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar (light or dark)

2 large eggs

1/4 cup molasses

1/4 cup honey

1 stick unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons ground ginger

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter an 8-inch cake pan.

Mix the milk, lemon juice, zest, brown sugar, eggs, molasses, honey, butter and vanilla in the container of the Vita-Mix. Start on #1 variable. Increase to #7. Run until combined, about 1 minute.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients. Add the dry ingredients to the container. Pulse on #5 a few times to incorporate. Do not over blend.

Pour into the cake pan.

Bake for 40 minutes, or until the top of the cake is dry and the cake has just begun to pull away from the sides of the pan.

Cool in pan before cutting.