An EASY gluten free gingerbread cake recipe eluded me for years. I would revisit the attempt every so often and lose interest because it took too long or required too many ingredients.
If you know me or my recipes very well, you know that I absolutely love to bake, but that I can’t stand still long enough to make anything too awfully complicated or with too many ingredients!
In fact, until this recipe, I’d tried creating a gluten free gingerbread recipe several times and the one thing that kept me from publishing it was that it had so darn many ingredients!
That’s the very reason I devised my award-winning gfJules Gluten Free All Purpose Flour — so that I and others living gluten free wouldn’t have to dart out to the store every time a recipe called for a new funky flour (only to be disappointed because it tasted funky too)!
Then one day it hit me. Why not use my gfJules™ Graham Cracker/Gingerbread Mix to make gingerbread? It seemed like it should be possible, and think how much easier it would be?!
So I worked at it for awhile and even came up with a couple other ingredient alternatives so you could pick what suited your tastes and what was already in your cabinet!
You can even use your own sugar alternative like unrefined coconut palm sugar or brown sugar Swerve (zero net carbs so it doesn’t affect blood sugar and it’s non-glycemic).
An argument for eating more cake? Potentially.
I’ve also given you the base ingredients if you want to make this recipe from scratch and don’t have my gfJules Gluten Free Graham Cracker/Gingerbread Mix. I’m so happy with this recipe (I’d better be — I’ve made it a half dozen times in the past few weeks to get it just right!), and so very happy to share it with you this holiday season!
Happy, and easy baking!
Easy Gluten Free Gingerbread Recipe
Pumpkin pie spices permeate this classic gingerbread cake that smells as good as it tastes!
Ingredients
from Mix:
- 1 gfJules® Graham Cracker/Gingerbread Mix
- 1 cup brown sugar, brown sugar Swerve, OR unrefined coconut palm sugar
- 1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice (OR 1/2 tsp. allspice + 1/2 tsp. ground ginger + 1/4 tsp. ground cloves)
- dash of salt
from Scratch:
- 1 cup brown sugar, brown sugar Swerve, OR unrefined coconut palm sugar
- 1 1/2 cups gfJules® All Purpose Gluten-Free Flour
- 1/2 cup certified gluten free buckwheat flour (Arrowhead Mills® Organic Buckwheat Flour), millet flour, OR almond meal
- 1 cup very fine white rice flour
- 1 Tbs. baking powder
- 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice (or 1/2 tsp. allspice + 1/2 tsp. ground ginger + 1/4 tsp. ground cloves)
- dash of salt
PLUS LIQUID ingredients:
- 3/4 cup shortening or coconut oil (or, if using butter instead, reduce applesauce to 1 cup + 2 Tbs.)
- 1 1/4 cup applesauce (“natural” applesauce is less sweet)
- 3 eggs or egg substitute (like 3 Tbs. flaxseed meal steeped in 9 Tbs. warm water, OR 9 Tbs. yogurt, OR egg-free mayo)
- 1/3 cup molasses OR coconut nectar
- 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup water
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350° F (static) or 325° F (convection).
Cream sugar with shortening, beating until light (approximately 3 minutes). Add applesauce, eggs/substitute, molasses and vanilla. Mix until fully incorporated.
If baking from scratch, whisk together dry ingredients in a separate bowl. Slowly add dry Graham Cracker/Gingersnap Mix OR whisk the from-scratch dry ingredients in a separate bowl then add slowly to the sugar mixture, beating while adding the water until the batter is smooth. It will still be thick.
Oil a 9 x 13 baking pan (or smaller pan and bake longer) and spoon batter into the pan; smooth the top with a rubber spatula.
Bake in preheated oven for 25-30 minutes, or until toothpick or cake tester inserted into the center comes out nearly clean. Depending on the size of the pan, the cake may need less or more time to fully bake (if it's thicker, it needs more time; thinner, it needs less). Cover with foil to finish baking if the top is browning or drying out.
Serve warm with whipped cream (or non-dairy version) or vanilla ice cream (dairy or non-dairy).
Notes
Serve fresh or once cooled, wrap in parchment paper, then aluminum foil, and freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw at room temperature and cut into squares to serve.
can I use sorghum flour instead of the buckwheat or almond? Don’t like the taste of buckwheat and can’t have nuts. Looked through the replies and couldn’t find a question addressing this.
Hi Connie, you could try sorghum or even millet should work here. Let me know what you think!
~jules
This looks delicious! Gingerbread just tastes like Christmas to me!
I know! It smells like Christmas, too! 🙂
~jules
Gingerbread is a favorite! The texture on this looks amazing.
I hope you love this recipe, too!
~jules
So YUMMY!!! I made the gingerbread with applesauce and yogurt substitute for egg. I ran out of applesauce and subbed a little pear sauce. I also turned them into muffins and sprinkled them with some sugar. Delicious! No one even knew they were gluten free.
Briget your substitutions sound amazing!Thanks for sharing and glad to hear the yogurt-for-egg sub worked! I need to get some of that pear sauce — sounds delish!!!!
~jules
I used the package mix to make carrot cake cupcakes today. They are still in the oven, so I don’t know how they taste yet. Have to improvise when you run out of Gluten Free Jules flour and you need to bring treats to work tomorrow.
I love that you improvised, Staci!! Brilliant!!!!!! I can’t wait to hear how they turned out and what you did to modify the recipe to use the mix!
~jules
I’m wondering if this could be made in the bread maker with the mix?
Hi Cheryl, I hadn’t considered that before, but why not?
Use the quick bread setting and see how it goes! Let me know!!
~jules
SUCCESS! Pumpkin was NOT the way to go for me. I used apple sauce this time, made sure to whip up/aerate the sugar&shortening really well, and added a little extra egg to cake it up. No more heavy yummy gingerbread, hello light & fluffy awesomeness!
AWESOME to hear, Kristin! So glad you made it with the applesauce and can enjoy sweet success!
I am sorry to say this recipe didn’t work out for me. The cake was very heavy and didn’t have much flavor. Usually your recipes are fantastic but this one didn’t make it. Sorry
Phylis R
Hi Phylis, I’m sorry to hear that you didn’t love this recipe. Did you use any recipe substitutions or any other variations that might have thrown it off?
Oh my goodness. Amazing. I just made this and it is still warm. This is such a treat!!! I used coconut oil and apple sauce. I was multitasking and almost forgot the spices, but fortunately I remembered before it was too terribly late. My batter was very thick and I was mildly concerned that it would be really dense, but it isn’t. Completely melts in your mouth.
Hi Michelle – I just had a few nibbles of my gingerbread for breakfast! It is soooo good! I’m so glad you tried the recipe and are enjoying the fruits of your (not so difficult!) labors!
I bake regularly, so I was very surprised that this did not turn out anything like expected. Mine looked nothing like the picture. It was horribly dense. I used coconut oil and pumpkin and did everything as stated in the recipe. So disappointed. I have 2 more of the packages of gingerbread/graham mix. Please help!
Hi Melody – that’s very strange! Please send us an email to [email protected] and we’ll try to walk through it with you to see what might have happened so it will be just right next time!
I chise to use crisco shortening, canned pumpkin, egg substitute, 2tsp water & 1/4c minced crystallized ginger. Nothing else differed. It was the consistency of cookie dough, I had to spread it flat into the baking dish…?
Hi Kristin, what egg substitute did you use?
Better Than Eggs (liquid) eggs in a carton, like egg beaters…
The dough was far stickier than I imagined, more like cookie dough. I also added 2tsp water and 1/4 chopped crystallized ginger. In the end, it’s delicious, but the texture is off… Thanks anyway for great mixes & recipes!!!
Hi Kristin, I’m so glad that it was delicious, but I’m wondering what might have happened with the texture. Did you make any ingredient substitutions?
Can I make the gingerbread in muffin tins?
Yes! Sue, I’m sure it would be delicious that way, just keep checking the bake time – be sure not to over-bake them!
Thought I had finished my Christmas baking, then remembered a package of your Graham Cracker/Gingersnap Mix.
Going to the kitchen right now!
Lucky find, Joey!!!
Home for the Holidays ROCKS!
I LOVE gingerbread, too.
I am planning on making this recipe for Christmas. If I use coconut oil instead of shortening, should I melt the coconut oil before I use it, or keep it in its solid form?
Hi Candice – if you use coconut oil, keep it in its solid state (room temp) for this recipe. Great question!
Also can I freeze this bread? Thinking of eating some and then freezing the rest to make a bread pudding some Saturday in December. Thanks again.
Sure – that sounds like a great idea, actually!
I was wondering what you thought about using this bread in a bread pudding? I would toast the bread but I wondered if it would not stand up well to milk?
I haven’t tried it in that application, but I can’t imagine it would be bad! If it tastes this good as a fresh, moist cake, then it would probably be delicious as bread pudding as well! Please let us all know how it turns out!
Thanks so much for this! Gingerbread with peaches and whipped topping is a favorite treat from my childhood – one of the few “dessert” foods that qualified for breakfast in my home growing up!
– Jennifer
can I use sorghum flour instead of the buckwheat or almond? Don’t like the taste of buckwheat and can’t have nuts. Looked through the replies and couldn’t find a question addressing this.