Gingerbread Fudge

Your holiday treat making won’t be complete without this Gingerbread Fudge! It’s perfectly spicy and sweet, and great for gifting!

• Full of Christmas flavor – This robust spice blend is most popular in gingerbread cookie, gingerbread cake and gingerbread men, but really the flavors can be incorporated into anything. Like homemade fudge!
• Great for adding to cookie trays – Perfect for filling cookie trays and bringing to holiday potlucks, you are going to devour this easy gingerbread fudge and people will beg for the recipe.

Types of Fudge Making

Let me first say that making a classic or traditional fudge is hard. It seems so simple, but there is actually a lot of chemistry, patience and knowledge involved.

But I don’t want that to hold you back from trying your hand at making fudge from scratch! With the right know-how, tools and instructions, anyone can do it.

There are a lot of fudge recipes out there, and many take shortcuts. Don’t get me wrong, I actually make several of the easy fudge recipes myself and they are very good.

But I feel like to get a good grasp on how to make any food, you also need to know how it was made the old fashioned way.

Traditional Fudge Making

Fudge is basically melted sugar, but the sugar needs something to dissolve into, you use light corn syrup, also a variation of sugar, and cream. The sugar melts and comes to the soft ball stage of candy making.

Slowly, the sugar dissolves and starts to lose the grainy texture and become smooth. While this all sounds simple, it is actually quite challenging.

For the best results, don’t rely on timing or your eyes, get a candy thermometer. Don’t stir during this time, it can separate and ruin the batch.

PRO TIP: Placing the bowl to cool on a cooling rack allows air to circulate around the whole bowl, helping the process happen faster and more even.

Next, you’ll want to remove from heat to stir in the spices, vanilla and butter. Let it cool before pouring into a pan. It’s HOT, so be careful!

Keep in mind that traditional fudge doesn’t actually have chocolate in it. You could use white chocolate chips, milk or dark chocolate, or even semi sweet chocolate chips or peanut butter chips, but it isn’t required and I don’t use it in my Gingerbread Fudge.

Ingredients

With just a handful of ingredients, you’ll have everything you need for making this delicious gingerbread fudge.

• Unsalted butter – I always cook and bake with unsalted butter to be able to control the salt content.
• Sugar – While the corn syrup and molasses have sugar, we also need a little granulated sugar to sweeten this fudge.
• Molasses – This is going to provide structure and also give you that true gingerbread flavor.
• Heavy cream – Despite being used interchangeably quite often, there is a difference. Heavy cream has more milk fat than whipping cream. Heavy cream is better for stabilized homemade whipped cream and thickening sauces because it has a higher milk fat and thicker texture, but only slightly.
• Fine sea salt – If using salted butter, be sure to omit this extra salt. No one wants a salty fudge!
• Pure vanilla extract – I love adding good quality vanilla for warmth and flavor in most desserts.
• Spices – Just like real gingerbread, we use a lot of spices for warmth. Ground ginger, ground cinnamon, allspice, ground cloves and nutmeg.

Variations

There are plenty of ways to make this gingerbread fudge recipe your own. Here are a few suggestions.

• Spices – Feel free to play around with the amounts and types of spices. Add more or less ginger or cinnamon to get different flavors.
• Pan size – You can choose the pan by how thick you like your fudge. The smaller the pan, the thicker the fudge and vice versa.
• Add ins – You might want to consider adding things like white chocolate chips or even chopped nuts to your fudge.

How to Make Gingerbread Fudge

1. Using a cold stick of butter, grease a large piece of parchment paper and then line an 8×8 square baking pan. Set aside.
2. Place the remaining 1 tablespoon of butter in a large glass or metal mixing bowl. Set that mixing bowl on a cooling rack. The mixture will be super hot and you won’t want to touch the moping bowl after you transfer the mixture. The cooling rack allows air to circulate all the way around the bowl, cooling faster.
3. Add heavy cream, sugar, dark corn syrup, molasses and salt into a medium heavy saucepan.
4. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until sugar has dissolved, approximately 10 minutes.
5. Increase to medium heat, bringing to a low boil. Do not stir or mix any longer. Attach candy thermometer and continue to cook without stirring. Allow candy thermometer to come to 240 degrees (soft ball stage) and continue to cook for 1 minute. This can take 10-15 minutes, so be patient.
6. Meanwhile, mix together ground ginger, ground cinnamon, allspice, ground cloves and nutmeg in a small bowl. Set aside.
7. Carefully pour mixture into mixing bowl with butter. Do not scrape the bottom of the pan in case any of the sugar scaled to the bottom.
8. Whisk butter, pure vanilla extract and spice mix into the mixture. It will be bubbly and hot. Be careful!
9. Allow to cool at room temperature for 30-40 minutes before mixing well and then transferring to the prepared and lined square dish.
10. Use a small offset spatula to quickly spread fudge to sides of pan and smooth top. Allow to further cool before covering and chilling in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours. If you want to ass embellishments or sprinkles, do it now while fudge is still tacky.
11. Lift parchment out of the square dish and cut into 1-inch pieces.

Storage and Freezing

How to Store Gingerbread Fudge

You can leave your fudge out at room temperature or in the fridge in an airtight container. However, fudge does not need to be stored in the refrigerator, in fact, cold air can actually dry the fudge out. Keep in an airtight container for up to 14 days.

Can I Freeze Gingerbread Fudge?

The best thing about this recipe is it can be made in advance and keeps very well!

This gingerbread fudge recipe can also be frozen to enjoy long after after the holiday party! When freezing homemade fudge, I like to double wrap it in freezer safe packaging to prevent freezer burn. 

I prefer to freeze fudge in a large block, rather than pre-cutting it. I feel this protects the inside better and ensures the freshest taste possible. 

Be sure to enjoy the fudge within two months. To thaw, bring it out to room temperature about 24 hours before you want to enjoy it. Store in an airtight container for freshness. 

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If you've ever wondered how to make fudge, there is no better homemade fudge recipe than this! Gingerbread Fudge made the old fashioned way!

Prep Time: 5 minutes mins

Cook Time: 15 minutes mins

Cooling Time: 10 hours hrs

Total Time: 10 hours hrs 20 minutes mins

Cook ModePrevent your screen from going dark

Servings: 64 1-inch squares

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Equipment

• Plastic Airtight Containers
• Heat Resistant Rubber Spatula
• 8×8 Baking Dish
• Offset Spatula
• Wire Cooling Rack
• Whisk
• Parchment Paper
• Box Grater

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter , plus more for greasing the pan
• 2 1/2 cups sugar
• ½ cup molasses
• ¼ cup dark corn syrup
• 1 ½ cups heavy cream
• ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• ½ teaspoon allspice
• ½ teaspoon ground cloves
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg

Instructions

• Using a cold stick of butter, grease a large piece of parchment paper and then line an 8×8 square baking pan. Set aside.
• Place the remaining 1 tablespoon of butter in a large glass or metal mixing bowl. Set that mixing bowl on a cooling rack. The mixture will be super hot and you won’t want to touch the moping bowl after you transfer the mixture. The cooling rack allows air to circulate all the way around the bowl, cooling faster.
• Add heavy cream, sugar, dark corn syrup, molasses and salt into a medium heavy saucepan.
• Cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until sugar has dissolved, approximately 10 minutes.
• Increase to medium heat, bringing to a low boil. Do not stir or mix any longer. Attach candy thermometer and continue to cook without stirring. Allow candy thermometer to come to 240 degrees (soft ball stage) and continue to cook for 1 minute. This can take 10-15 minutes, so be patient.
• Meanwhile, mix together ground ginger, ground cinnamon, allspice, ground cloves and nutmeg in a small bowl. Set aside.
• Carefully pour mixture into mixing bowl with butter. Do not scrape the bottom of the pan in case any of the sugar scaled to the bottom.
• Whisk butter, pure vanilla extract and spice mix into the mixture. It will be bubbly and hot. Be careful!
• Allow to cool at room temperature for 30-40 minutes before mixing well and then transferring to the prepared and lined square dish.
• Use a small offset spatula to quickly spread fudge to sides of pan and smooth top. Allow to further cool before covering and chilling in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours. If you want to ass embellishments or sprinkles, do it now while fudge is still tacky.
• Lift parchment out of the square dish and cut into 1-inch pieces.
• Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator.
• If you’ve tried this recipe, come back and let us know how it was!

Nutrition

Calories: 63 kcal, Carbohydrates: 11 g, Protein: 1 g, Fat: 2 g, Saturated Fat: 1 g, Cholesterol: 8 mg, Sodium: 24 mg, Potassium: 43 mg, Fiber: 1 g, Sugar: 11 g, Vitamin A: 87 IU, Vitamin C: 1 mg, Calcium: 10 mg, Iron: 1 mg

Calories: 63

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Keyword: gingerbread fudge, old fashioned fudge

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