Toffee ginger cakes with fudgy icing

I don't often go to Waitrose, since it's about a twenty five minute drive from me, passing about five other supermarkets on the way! but I like to go occasionally to browse the special offers (which can sometimes be very competitive - who says Tesco is always cheapest?) and when I'm there I try and pick up the monthly recipe cards that they produce. There are usually 8 or 9 each month, showcasing seasonal ingredients and there tends to be a starter, meat, fish, veggie, childrens etc, and usually a baking/dessert one. This month toffee ginger cakes with fudgy icing was the recipe.

It just sounded perfect for the time of year - it's been really cold recently all of a sudden and ginger is such a lovely warming spice. These seemed the perfect way to use ginger in a cupcake. The recipe is based on the Waitrose one here, but because I tend to buy large rather than medium eggs I upped the amounts of flour, sugar and butter, as shown below.

Toffee ginger cakes with fudgy icing

Ingredients

120g soft butter

120g light brown soft sugar

1tsp ground ginger

25g golden syrup (I didn't weigh this, just put about a tbsp in!)

120g self raising flour

2 large eggs

For the fudgy icing:

25g butter

50g light brown soft sugar

2 tbsp warm water

100g icing sugar, sifted

To decorate:

Pieces of crystallised stem ginger and fudge

Method

- Preheat the oven to 200C/Gas 6. Place paper cases in a 12 hole muffin tin.

- Beat the butter and sugar together with an electric whisk for 2-3 minutes until pale and creamy.

- Beat in the ginger and golden syrup until well combined.

- Add the flour and eggs and beat like crazy with the electric whisk. (OK, so these aren't the original instructions - they tell you to gradually add a little egg followed by a little flour, etc until both are used up. Do that option if you have the patience. I don't!)

- Spoon into the paper cases and bake for 15-20 minutes until golden and well risen. Place on a wire rack to cool.

NB They may take longer than 20 mins because they are slightly bigger than the original recipe, but do check at 15 mins because the oven is hotter than usual for little cakes and mine were a little overbrowned on the tops by 20 minutes.

For the icing

- Melt the butter and brown sugar in a small saucepan.

- Bring to the boil, add the water and simmer for 5 minutes. It will look very runny.

- Remove from the heat and beat in the icing sugar until smooth. It stiffens up, and if it becomes too stiff add boiling water a little (i.e. 1 tbsp) at a time to soften it.

- Spread over the cakes and decorate with the chunks of fudge or crystallised stem ginger. The icing sets with a crust so it's best to decorate as quickly as possible.

Mmmm, fudge! I went heavy on the fudge for the ones I took into work, but heavy on the crystallised ginger for me, because I love it. It might be a bit of an acquired taste though!

All packaged up and ready to go into work, where they were extremely well received. Plently of praise for these gently spiced little buns.