Sticky gingerbread, fragrant honey ice cream and a rich chocolate ganache. This dessert really is as good as it sounds.
Adapted from a recipe published in Olive magazine back in November 2009, apparently it’s the signature dessert of The Restaurant at St Paul’s in London. This pudding is so delicious I’m not surprised it’s a permanent fixture on their menu.
I changed up the recipe a little, adding a smooth dark chocolate ganache spiked with ginger syrup. As I couldn’t find black treacle, I substituted a mixture of dark muscovado (or treacle sugar as it is called here in SA) and golden syrup. This was a great success as even without the other components, the light, spiced ginger cake is probably the best I’ve ever tasted.
I must admit the ice cream was very soft (not helped by an inefficient freezer) and assembling all the components into a neat sandwich did prove something of a challenge. Next time I would probably just serve a square of the gingerbread, fresh from the oven, with a scoop of the ice cream. Not quite as fancy but utterly delicious all the same.
This dish fulfills a triple whammy of challenge entries this month. It’s being submitted too:
- Blue Kitchen Bakes and the Classic French Challenge as the theme for February is ganache
- Blue Kitchen Bakes (again!) and Choclette for We Should Cocoa as the theme is chocolate and ginger
- Kavey Eats and Blogger’s Scream for Ice Cream where to celebrate the first birthday of BSFIC we are allowed to pick any theme from the past year. I’ve chosen custard-based ice-creams.
Honey Ice Cream & Gingerbread Sandwich (adapted from Olive magazine)
Makes 4
For the honey ice cream:
- 110g clear honey
- 2 egg yolks
- 200ml double cream
- 100ml milk
For the gingerbread:
- 55g butter
- 55g dark muscovado/treacle sugar
- 55g golden syrup
- 1 egg
- 85g plain flour
- 2 tsp ginger
- 75ml milk
- 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 25g dark chocolate
- 2 tbsp double cream
- 1 tsp ginger syrup from a jar of stem ginger
1. To make the ice cream, warm the honey and pour on to the egg yolks, whisking as you do so. Heat the milk and cream in a pan to boiling point then pour on to the yolk mixture, again whisking constantly. Return the mixture to the pan and cook over a low heat, stirring all the time, until the custard thickens and coats the back of a spoon. Chill and then churn in an ice-cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions. Spoon the ice cream into a lined loaf tin and freeze till firm.
2. To make the gingerbread, preheat the oven to 160C/140C fan. Melt the butter, sugar and syrup in a pan. Allow to cool slightly. Whisk in the egg then beat in the flour and ginger. Gently warm the milk then stir into the gingerbread mixture with the bicarbonate of soda. Pour into a lined loaf tin (the same size as the one you used for the ice-cream) and bake for about 20 minutes until springy and a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean. Leave to cool completely. Wrap in baking parchment to store if not using immediately.
3. For the ganache, gently melt the chocolate, cream and ginger syrup in a bain marie or microwave. Stir until smooth. Slice the gingerbread through the middle, lengthways, and smother one half in the chocolate ganache. Leave to set a little.
4. To assemble, turn the ice-cream out of the loaf tin and sandwich between the two layers of gingerbread, ganache layer uppermost. Trim the edges and cut into 4 slices with a sharp knife.
It looks wonderful! Much easier to eat than a biscuit-based ice cream sandwich. And chocolate and ginger is such a divine combination.
Thanks Alicia. It really was lovely and I agree, chocolate and ginger is a wonderful combo.
That looks soo decadent. I’m such a sucker for anything ice cream.
Thank you! As you say, it is decadent but at the same time surprising light too.
Apart from all the lovely flavours I love the presentation of this dessert. Not sure if I would manage to cut through the ice cream without it squashing all over the place. Yours looks so perfect.
Thanks Ang. As I say, I probably wouldn’t bother sandwiching it next time. It was quite a faff and if I had dinner guests, they probably would have fallen asleep by the time I got this to table! Worth the effort though.
This looks fantastic, I’m impressed at how neatly you lined up the gingerbread with the ice cream. Thanks for entering into Classic French and We Should Cocoa!
Thanks Jen. It wasn’t easy, I can tell you. Particularly as I have a decrepit freezer that never keeps ice-cream at anything more than soft scoop!
Wow, that looks good. I love gingerbread but I don’t usually think of combining it with ice cream. More fool me. You’ve also reminded me that I haven’t been to St Paul’s for too long.
Thanks Phil. I’ve never been to St Paul’s but if the rest of the menu is this good, then I’m sure I’d love it.
If this is anything like speculoos then I’m sold on this dessert! Looks lovely.
Not quite as aromatic as speculoos although there is no reason why you couldn’t use speculoos spices in the gingerbread. That would be a great idea!
It looks perfect! I often freeze each stage for ice cream photos
Thanks Tandy. I’ve tried doing that in the past but my freezer is so rubbish that it takes hours and hours to freeze anything.
Oh this looks fabulous, I am definitely bookmarking this recipe.
Thank you Janice. I hope you get round to trying it as it’s really, really good.
The flavours in this sound amazing and I cant believe how perfect you’ve got the ‘sandwich’. Will definitely be giving this recipe a try, although I may do the slice and scoop as you suggest!
Oh wow, soft ice-cream or not, these look absolutely perfect. Just when I think there can’t be any new combinations left, I get shown how wrong I can be. I do like a good gingerbread, so even if I don’t manage the ice-cream, I might try that bit as you rate it so highly.
Forgot to say, thank you for joining in with We Should Cocoa
This looks absolutely wonderful, I’m so sorry I missed it earlier, I can only apologise. REALLY want to try this one, it looks SO GOOD!