Gingerbread Cake

This gingerbread is dark and spicy, laced with allspice, aniseed, black pepper, ground coffee, and blackstrap molasses. Freshly grated ginger adds a bright heat, unlike ground ginger, which has a hot, sharp bite. Buy the freshest, youngest ginger you can find, and grate it with a Microplane (a grater with very fine holes). Grate the ginger over the bowl containing the wet ingredients so that you catch any ginger juice that falls from the grater. This is a simple cake that is best ser