Ginger pudding with ginger caramel sauce

I am reading The Fortune Cookie Chronicles at the moment, and author, Jennifer 8. Lee, writes about growing up in a Chinese-American household where desserts are a fairly sorry affair.  In fact, fancy baked goods are not much of a feature of Chinese cuisine at all, and most homes in China do not even have an oven. 

In having a Chinese-Australian background, I can relate to the dessert deficiency, as I'd never eaten any type of pudding (including Christmas!) until I was in my late teens.  So this is my first-ever attempt at making a proper pudding.  The recipe is from Terry Durack in Good Weekend magazine, though I've substituted my own caramel sauce, with ginger added.

Oh, and I know that it's called a steamed ginger pudding, but because I made it in a large baking dish, I didn't actually 'steam' it (by putting the dish in a baking pan of hot water).

Steamed ginger pudding with ginger caramel sauce

serves 4

Ingredients

2 tsp butter, for greasing

4 tsp golden syrup

125g butter, diced

125g soft brown sugar

2 eggs

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

125g self-raising flour, sifted

60ml milk

2 tsp ground ginger

2 tsp ground cinnamon

2 tblsp preserved or crystallised ginger, finely diced

Sauce

60g butter

85g brown sugar

2 tblsp preserved or crystallised ginger, finely diced

125ml (1/2 cup) cream

Method

1.  Heat oven to 180C.  Lightly butter a 600ml ovenproof dish and place the golden syrup in the bottom.  Or you could use smaller (4 x 150ml) dishes.

2.  Beat the butter and sugar until creamy.

3.  Beat in the eggs and vanilla extract.

4.  Fold in the sifted flour and milk alternately, to make a smooth batter. If the batter is very stiff, add a bit more milk.

5.  Fold in the ground ginger, cinnamon and crystallised ginger.

6.  Spoon the mixture into the prepared dish and cover tightly with a sheet of buttered foil.  Bake for 40 minutes, or until the pudding springs back to the touch.  If using smaller dishes, put the dishes in a baking tray half-filled with boiling water before baking (hence 'steaming' them).

7.  To make the sauce, melt the butter and brown sugar in a saucepan with the ginger and simmer for 3 minutes.  Then pour in the cream and simmer for another 3 minutes.

8.  To serve, pour the sauce over a spoonful of pudding on a plate.  Serve with cream or ice cream.

Recipe adapted from Good Weekend (26th June 2010)

From top: pudding before baking; making the caramel sauce; pudding and sauce ready to be served.  The pudding turned out to be surprisingly light, fluffy and spongey.

Serve the pudding warm with whipped cream and crystallised ginger sprinkled on top.

This was a good pudding - I am quite annoyed at missing out all those years ago.