Cake has been on my mind these last few weeks as I’ve been celebrating milestones. My family calendar includes numerous May birthdays, which are always occasions to bake a cake or pie. This year, we also celebrated my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary. I baked them the stacked version of Chocolate Pudding Cake filled with homemade strawberry-rhubarb-lilac jam, coated with Chocolate Ganache, and topped with fresh strawberries.

This month, I’m celebrating 8 years of Twice as Tasty, so I’m sharing yet another cake recipe in my latest Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon. I developed this recipe to use three forms of ginger, mimicking the layers of flavor in my favorite Triple Gingersnaps. But unlike the crisp cookies, I always want my cakes to be moist and soft. This cake achieves that through molasses, eggs, and baking soda dissolved in hot water.

Learn more about baking with ginger and get the complete recipe for Triple Ginger Cake in my column.

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Twice as Tasty

The layers of ginger and elements that help form a soft crumb make the ingredient list for this ginger cake seem long and complicated. But like most cakes, it’s simpler than you would think to mix and bake—especially if you have the right tools ready to use.

When you’re making this week’s recipe, a few tools and tricks will keep your cake moist and light.

• You can use any type of cake pan, but I recommend a Bundt or 9-1/2-inch springform so that the cake releases easily and looks attractive when unadorned. Yet like Chocolate Pudding Cake, this recipe can be baked in a square pan, sprinkled with powdered sugar, and cut into simple squares for lunchboxes or weeknight dessert.
• A heavily floured pan can give the cake a mottled look, which I kind of enjoy. Keep the flour light or line the springform base with parchment instead if you want a uniform exterior.
• Including just a little freshly ground black pepper with the spices adds a spectrum of flavors. You won’t get the same result from preground black pepper, because the spice’s volatile oils dissipate in under an hour, leaving behind the sharpness but little else.
• If you don’t have a way to grind whole peppercorns, such as in a hand-cranked pepper mill, bladed coffee grinder, or electric spice grinder, leave the black pepper out of the recipe—and seriously consider adding whole peppercorns and a grinding tool to your kitchen. Call it a Twice as Tasty birthday present to yourself if you need an excuse.
• You probably buy dried ginger preground and keep it among your spices. Like pepper, its flavor fades, but this takes far more time. Dried ginger starts to lose its potency after about 6 months but will still have enough flavor to be usable for a couple of years.
• I like blackstrap molasses in this cake, whose powerful flavor stands up well to the myriad gingers. If you find the flavor too intense, dial back to a mild molasses.
• The fizzy soda water gives this cake a slightly crisp outside and soft interior, making it easier to cut and ideal for a drizzled topping that soaks slightly into the surface. Next week, I’ll share my recipe for homemade caramel sauce, one of my favorite toppings for this cake. You could instead use a Lemon and Sugar Glaze or the Buttermilk Glaze I drizzle over Sourdough Cinnamon Rolls.

Find more cake and cookie recipes in recipe index.

Want more Twice as Tasty recipes? Get my books! Click here to order a personally signed, packaged, and shipped copy of The Complete Guide to Pickling directly from me. I also share tasty ways to use pickles in The Pickled Picnic; it’s only available here.