Dutch Recipe For Kruidkoek Or Spice Cake With Raisins

Peperkoek and kruidkoek are both Dutch words for spice cake. It is a popular breakfast product in the Netherlands, and used as an alternative for a sandwich, but also complementary.

The most well-known brand for Kruidkoek or Peperkoek, is Peijnenburg.
Peperkoek can also be found on the lunch table, and is sometimes served as a snack with a cup of tea at 10 in the morning or 4 in the afternoon.
 

We have an easy recipe for you to make your own kruidkoek with raisins. It’s different from the ones you buy in stores, because this is more like a regular cake, so if you’d like to compare this one to the ones mentioned above, you can find the ‘peperkoek/kruidkoek’ here.

This particular spice cake is best presented with a nice cup of tea or coffee.
If you don’t like raisins, you can just leave them out. (As a tasty autumny variation to this kruidkoek, you can add some grated apple!)



Ingredients:

• 300 grams of wholemeal/whole wheat flour
• 1 sachet of baking powder
• 250 grams of dark caster sugar/brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon of ‘koekkruiden’, also known as mixed spice: cinnamon/cardamom/nutmeg/allspice
• 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
• 1 (cleaned) orange
• 1 egg
• 1 full tablespoon of ‘schenkstroop’/ molasses 
• 200 milliliters of milk
• 200 grams of raisins
• 1 cake tin (+/- 2 liters)
• 1 wooden skewer

Instructions:

1: Preheat the oven at 175 degrees Celsius, pour the wholemeal/whole wheat flour , baking powder, caster sugar/brown sugar, koekkruiden/mix spice, cinnamon powder and a pinch of salt into a bowl.
Thinly grate the orange peel, and add this to the ingredients in the bowl also. Add the egg white and yolk, and also the schenkstroop/molasses.
Now slowly add the milk while stirring gently until you have a smooth mix.
Add the raisins and stir them through the batter.

2: Pour the batter into a greased cake tin. Place the tin in the middle of the oven, and make sure it’s in the lower half of the oven. Bake for 1 hour.

3: After 1 hour, stick the wooden skewer into your cake. If it comes out dry, your kruidkoek’s ready. If it’s not, bake it for another 10 – 15 minutes, and check again with the skewer.
Take it out of the oven, and let it cool for 10 minutes. Remove the tin gently, and let your kruidcake cool off.

*Tip*: This spice cake is at its best when its 2 days old (In the meantime it has to be wrapped up in foil or put into a storage container), because this way the flavors of the spices will be at their tastiest!

Eet smakelijk! (Enjoy your meal!)



(Recipe source: AH.nl – Allerhande, images courtesy of Peijnenburg and AH.nl)

Tags: kruidkoek, peperkoek, spice cake, raisins, pepper cake, peijnenburg, hollands, dutch, food, recipe, blog