Ontbijtkoek (Dutch Spice Cake)

I've been scrambling to use up sourdough starter over the last couple days. I mixed up some bread dough yesterday and another small batch today, but I still had starter to use and was feeling in the mood for something in the cake/muffin/quickbread family. My original intent had been to make a gingerbread cake. I knew I'd seen a recipe kicking around on Northwest Sourdough blog a while back, so I figured I'd give that one a go. Rather than searching the blog for it though, I just googled "sourdough gingerbread". And that did indeed turn up the recipe I was looking for. But it also turned up a gingerbread cookie recipe on a blog I'd never heard of before. But with a name like "Bubbling Starter", I figured I had to check it out!

It didn't take me long to stumble across this ontbijtkoek recipe. (No, I don't know how it's meant to be pronounced.) The recipe looked interesting: rye flour and lots of spices and brown sugar. And it used sourdough discard, so I was sold!

According to the author this is a classic Dutch breakfast cake and is usually served topped with butter and/or Gouda. As far as I can tell, the name actually literally translates as "breakfast cake". I decided to buck tradition and have a bit for dessert and oh my goodness, is it ever delicious! I will definitely be making more "breakfast cake" in the future!

If I have one small disappointment with the recipe it's that the cake fell in the centre. I know it wasn't underbaked, because it was already sunken before I took it out of the oven. And I didn't open the door or peek at it during baking, so that's not the culprit either. My best guess is that maybe there was a bit too much leavener in it. I thought 1 tsp. of baking soda seemed like a lot for the amount of batter, especially considering that it already contained 2 tsp. of baking powder. The cake is still delicious! No issues there. But I'll probably try scaling the bicarb back to just 1/2 a tsp. next time to see if that helps at all.

Ontbijtkoek

Slightly adapted from Bubbling Starter

Ingredients

• 120g (1 c.) all-purpose flour
• 120g (1 c.) rye flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1/2 tsp. cardamom seeds (from green pods)
• 1/8 tsp. coriander seeds
• 1/8 tsp. black peppercorns
• 1/8 tsp. anise seeds
• 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp. ground cloves
• 125g sourdough discard
• 3/4 c. milk
• 120g (1/2 c.) brown sugar
• 1/4 c. molasses
• 1/4 c. honey
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 150°C (300°F) and grease and flour a loaf pan¹.
2. Combine the flours and sift in the baking powder and baking soda.
3. Add the salt, cardamom, coriander, peppercorns, and anise seeds to a spice grinder and grind to a fine powder (or use a mortar and pestle).
4. Stir in the cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves.
5. Add the spice mix to the flour mixture and stir to combine.
6. In a separate bowl, combine the sourdough discard, milk, brown sugar, molasses, honey, and vanilla and mix well.
7. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until just combined.
8. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf tin and bake at 150°C (300°F) for 1 hour.
9. Remove from oven and let cool in pan for 10 minutes.
10. Turn out onto wire rack to finish cooling.
11. Serve with butter and/or Gouda cheese. (The cake should be sliced thin and the butter spread thick!²)

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Variants

Vegan Version

Ingredients

• 120g (1 c.) all-purpose flour
• 120g (1 c.) rye flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1/2 tsp. cardamom seeds (from green pods)
• 1/8 tsp. coriander seeds
• 1/8 tsp. black peppercorns
• 1/8 tsp. anise seeds
• 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp. ground cloves
• 125g sourdough discard
• 3/4 c. nut or soy milk
• 120g (1/2 c.) brown sugar
• 1/4 c. molasses
• 1/4 c. golden syrup, corn syrup, or agave syrup
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract

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¹ The recipe didn't specify the size of loaf pan. I ended up going with an 8.5x4.5" pan. I might try an 8x4" (20cm by 10cm) pan at some point just to see how it compares, but I think either one is probably acceptable. ^Back
2 Although I won't judge you if you also want to slice the cake thick. ^Back