Recipe: Pepernotencake

Today in the Netherlands we celebrate Sinterklaas. And those festivities come with their own traditional treats. One of them being pepernoten or in this case technically kruidnoten. These are a kind of gingerbread mini cookies. All though I don't really celebrate Sinterklaas this year, I did so some baking and today I want to share that recipe with you.

I pinned that recipe on Pinterest, so this is also my first pin for another round of the Pin It and Do It challenge from Trish at Love, Laughter and a Touch of Insanity. You can find the Dutch recipe and original pin here.

Now for all my non Dutch readers, this recipe might be hard to make because of lack of pepernoten. But I am sure you will be able to find something that tastes similar. I just wanted to share a piece of Dutch tradition today.

Pepernotencake
- 250gr cake mix
- 200gr white castor sugar
- 200gr butter
- 3 free range or organic eggs (m)
- 75gr shaved almond
- 100gr kruidnootjes (gingerbread cookies)
- 1 tbsp Dutch "koek en speculaas" mix (a mix of cinnamon, coriander, nutmeg, clove, ginger, cardamom and orange peel)

Use butter to grease a cake tin. Mix the butter and the sugar together. Add the eggs one by one. Only add the next egg when the previous egg is well mixed in the batter. Then add the cakemix and the "koek en speculaas mix" and mix until you get a sticky batter. Add the "kruidnootjes" to the batter. Scoop the batter into the cake tin and sprinkle the almond on top. Bake the cake for about 60-70 minutes on 160 degrees. But it is different for each oven. Mine took 80 minutes. I baked the last 20 minutes with silver foil on top to prevent the cake from getting too dark. The cake is done when a wooden pick comes out clean.

Some process pictures:

 Before the cake went into the oven. The batter is sticky and a bit of a mess. That's okay.

 After it was baked.

I hope that everyone who celebrates Sinterklaas tonight, will have a great time! This is a great recipe btw to use up your leftover "kruidnoten" even when they are stale, because they will soften in the oven anyway.

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