Gin & Tonic Loaf Cake!
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A delicious gin & tonic drizzle cake with a lime sponge, gin & tonic drizzle, gin icing, and lime!
Gin and tonic
One of the most iconic drinks in the world, a gin and tonic is a delightful drink that is so versatile in flavours and taste with how many gins are available, and how many tonics are available now too.
Whether you like it more spiced, or sweeter, there is definitely a flavour out there for you – and it’s just SUCH a refreshing drink. I switch mine up all the time as I adore so many, but if you have a favourite combo, why not dry it in cake form as well?
If you aren’t a fan of tonic, you can use lemonade as well – it works the same in this recipe as the tonic does. It’s easy to make a delicious bake with whatever drinks you have in the cupboard.
Baking with G&T
You guys have completely raved about my gin & tonic cupcakes, and my gin & tonic fudge since I posted them. Honestly, I thought they could be reasonably popular, but I am amazed but how they are continually popular day in and day out.
Therefore, when my brother suggested a gin & tonic drizzle cake, I knew it had to happen. It was DELIGHTFUL. I honestly can’t love it any more. Why not combine the ideas of a lemon drizzle cake, where you have the deliciously easy baked loaf cake sponge, made extra delicious with a drizzle on top? But this time, it’s a G&T poured on top?!
Loaf cake
I went for simplicity with the cake part of this recipe, because sometimes simple is best. It’s basically a victoria sponge type recipe with proportional ingredients for the cake such as the butter, sugar, flour and eggs. However, I did add in some lime zest to give it a little hint of flavour. I didn’t want it to be completely plain, but it has just enough in it to give it a bit of flavour.
I used a loaf cake style tin as I haven’t baked a loaf cake in a while, and I thought it would suit this cake! You can easily make it into a different shape or style, or even add the G&T buttercream from my gin & tonic cupcakes, but thats up to you! The drizzle is really very simple as well.
Drizzle
You need the sugar in it to give it a bit of substance, and make it drizzle like (such as you use for lemon & lime drizzle cake type recipes), otherwise using just gin and tonic might make it slightly soggy rather than drizzly.
It’s very easy and simple to just dissolve the sugar into the gin and the tonic, and huzzah you’re done. Drizzling it over the cake, and letting it soak in is the painful part, as you just want to eat the cake already!
Decoration
I was wondering whether using gin in the ‘water icing’ would work, but it did! It sort of makes it a sweet gin flavour, so you definitely have to like gin to like the icing. You can of course just use water, but I adore it with the gin! It packs an absolute punch, but it needs to right?!
I also decorated the cake with some lime slices and lime zest to go with the flavour of the sponge and the theme of the drink (because if you haven’t guessed yet, I like a lime in my G&T), but you can switch this up if it’s not for you.
Tips & Tricks
- This cake will last for 4-5+ days at room temp
- You can freeze this cake for 3+ months
- The decoration can be changed to whatever you want
- Any gin will work
- Any tonic will work
- The tonic can be switched to lemonade
- I use this 2lb loaf tin in the recipe
- I use these small piping bags for the decoration
Gin & Tonic Drizzle Cake!
Ingredients
Cake Ingredients
- 250 g unsalted butter
- 250 g caster sugar
- 250 g self raising flour
- 5 medium eggs
- 1 lime zested
Drizzle
- 75 g caster sugar
- 5 tbsp gin
- 5 tbsp tonic water
Icing
- 200 g icing sugar
- 3-4 tbsp gin
Decoration
- 1 Lime zested
- Lime slices
Instructions
For the Cake!
- Grease and Line a 2lb loaf tin, and preheat your oven to 180ºc/160ºc fan
- Cream together your butter and caster sugar until light and fluffy.
- Add in the eggs, flour, and lime zest, and beat again until smooth and combined.
- Pour your cake ingredients into your tin, and bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes. When baked fully, a cake skewer should come out clean, and the cake shouldn't be making a bubbling sound.
- Remove the cake from the oven and leave to cool slightly whilst making the drizzle.
For the Drizzle!
- Add your caster sugar, gin, and tonic to a small pan.
- Heat on a low-medium whilst stirring, and wait for the sugar to dissolve. Once dissolved, turn off the heat.
- Poke your cake lightly with a cake skewer/fork, and then drizzle over the drizzle. Leave the cake to cool fully in the tin.
To Decorate!
- Once the cake has cooled, remove it from the tin.
- In a small bowl, add your icing sugar, and gradually mix in the gin until you get a thick pourable consistency. You don't want it too thin otherwise it will all run off.
- Pour or drizzle the icing over the cake, and sprinkle over some lime zest, and then add some lime slices for more decoration.
Notes
- This cake will last for 4-5+ days at room temp
- You can freeze this cake for 3+ months
- The decoration can be changed to whatever you want
- Any gin will work
- Any tonic will work
- The tonic can be switched to lemonade
- I use this 2lb loaf tin in the recipe
- I use these small piping bags for the decoration
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J x
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Love this recipe it’s by far one of my favourite summertime bakes lovely and fresh tasting.. well done love your recipes xz
Apologies I made a typo in my email address
Please to know the size cake tin (round) for this recipe
I’m not a baker at all so this my be a really silly question
Hey! I already have a round version on my blog!
I really want to try this for my boyfriends birthday next week but would like to make it round in a cake tin, what equivalent size cake tin (round) should I use to use this amount of ingredients. Thanks you
Made the cake exactly according to the recipe and specifically bought the correct size loaf tin. However in the cake batter has spilled over the side of the tin a lot and after 45 minutes in the oven it’s still very liquid. Just hope some of it is salvageable as it’s for my girlfriend’s birthday cake.
I’ve made this recipe countless times and so have a lot of people but I’ve never heard or seen this happening unfortunately – I’m afraid it sounds like something was measured incorrectly to cause this! It also may be that the tins are different sizes – sometimes a 2lb loaf tin, can be varying in size even though they are called the same!
Hi, I’ve made many of your cakes and this is the first one I’ve had trouble with, but found a solution that I would like to share for anyone else that might be struggling. Same issue with the cake not baking in the middle – after 45 minutes it was baked on the sides but watery in the middle. I’ve sorted it by dropping the temperature from 180C to about 160C, and putting the cake lower in the oven. It had come out perfect after about 1:15hrs. I think the medium eggs I’ve used would have passed for large, and my tin was quite small, so that might be why!
Ah yes, if your tin was smaller then it will definitely cause a problem, along with too much egg. I bake mine at 160C as my oven is a fan oven and it works wonders!
Is the drizzle meant to thicken? or should it be a watery consistency? Going to attempt this for my mums birthday!
No, the drizzle is just designed to soak into the sponge so doesn’t really thicken!
If I wanted to make the lime sponge vegan, what would you recommend as the egg substitute? I normally use a 1:1 flax egg replacement ratio, but just wanted to see if you had other ideas. Thanks!
This looks amazing! Going to try it this weekend, are you able to use lemonade inf the drizzle instead of tonic water?
Yes you could!
Could i use the new Gordons sicilian lemon gin for this? X
Yes you can! You can use any gin you fancy!
Baked this for my husband’s 40th during “lockdown” and it turned out brilliantly – so thanks for the recipe 🙂 Added lime and lemon zest to the cake mixture, used 150g of sugar and around 200g of salted butter because I ran out of unsalted (and it wasn’t that salty!) Also added lime and lemon juice to the drizzle and the zest to the icing….super lush!
Do you think slim line tonic will work okay 🙂 going to make this weekend and wondering if I keep to get some in or can use what I have.
Can’t wait x
Slimeline tonic should be fine!
iv made the cake and icing is on now, and icing is setting, when in a container ,do I store in fridge as its covered or in a cupboard. thanks.
I would just store at room temp on the side in a container!
How long in the freeze can I keep it, is a month too long (without icing of course)? Iv made before so i know its good. Thanks
A month is fine!