Ginger Crunch

I have been eating lots of ginger flavoured things lately - ginger yogurt, ginger oat biscuits and I've also been drinking ginger tea and ginger beer. I just can't seem to get enough of it. Yesterday I made a batch of one of New Zealand's favourite slices - ginger crunch.

Many New Zealand recipe books offer their own variation on this treat - but I always use the one from the Edmonds Cookery Book. My mum tries to encourage me to modernise it with the addition of chopped pistachios or something. But, I stick to the original recipe as written below. I actually double the ingredients for the icing though as I like it nice and thick. I also don't bother with the kneading step for the base. I simply mix the ingredients together and the press the crumbly mixture into a tin. I like to use a square cake tin with a loose base as it is really easy to get the slice out of this.

David Lebovitz wrote a post on this slice in 2013. You can see his comments about finding an alternative for golden syrup there.

Ginger Crunch (as found in the Edmonds Cookery Book)

125 g butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
11/2 cups standard plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground ginger

Ginger Icing
75 g butter
3/4 cup icing sugar
2 tablespoons golden syrup
1 teaspoon ground ginger

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Sift flour, baking powder and ginger together. Mix into creamed mixture. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured board. Knead well. Press dough into a greased 20 x 30 cm sponge roll tin. Bake at 190 degrees Celsius for 20 to 25 minutes or until light brown. Pour hot Ginger Icing over base while hot and cut into squares before it gets cold.
Makes 24.

Ginger Icing
In a small saucepan combine butter, icing sugar, golden syrup and ginger. Heat until butter is melted, stirring constantly.

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