Festive Gingerbread Bundt

How ace is Christmas baking?! I'm not a fan of the standard mince pies and rum laced fruit cake combo, but I do love something spicy, scented with all things festive. Last week's cake club theme was 'Winter Wonderland', and was the perfect opportunity for me to crack open the Christmas sprinkles!

This simple bundt cake is living proof that you don't need to go all 'sugar-paste mental' to make something which is as pretty as it is tasty. I got these cute little gingerbread man sprinkles from the Cake Decorating Store. I resisted using one of my seasonal tins (for now) in favour of my trusted Anniversary tin so I could show off the decoration.

Ingredients:

• 225g butter
• 450g golden caster sugar
• 4 medium eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp lemon extract
• 350g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 7 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp mixed spice
• 100g finely chopped crystallised ginger
• 250ml ginger yoghurt (I used Rachel's Organic)
• 300g icing sugar
• Lemon juice
• Sprinkles (optional)

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to gas 3/160 c
2. Prepare a regular sized bundt tin - 2.4l, 10 cup, 10 inch with Cake Release spray and dust with flour.
3. Cream the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
4. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. 
5. Add the extracts.
6. In a separate bowl, measure out the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt, spices and crystallised ginger. 
7. Pour the yoghurt into a jug.
8. Sift in a third of the flour mix followed by half the yoghurt. Repeat this until everything is combined. The crystallised ginger will be trapped in your sieve but covered in flour - this helps to stop it from sinking.
9. Stir the ginger chunks into the cake mix.
10. Give everything a quick mix on a low speed for about 10 seconds.
11. Pour the mix into your prepared tin. 
12. Bake in the centre of the oven for about 1 hour 15 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. 
13. Leave the cake to cool for ten minutes before removing from the tin.
14. When completely cool, mix the icing sugar with enough lemon juice to make a runny icing and tip over the cake with enough festive giddiness to do the trick. 
15. Sprinkle with little ginger men.

Bloggers: Please respect the fact I am sharing my own ideas and basic recipe. Blood, sweat and many tears have gone into getting this right, so you may enjoy a perfect bundt. If you wish to re-blog a recipe from these variations, please credit my blog and link to this original post rather than pasting the recipe on your own page.