Pear & Almond Cake
"I used a Comice pear - my favourite variety - for this recipe as the texture and taste are both excellent. Whichever variety you use, it is essential that the pear is absolutely ripe."
Preparation: 35 minutes + 1ΒΌ hours baking plus cooling
Ingredients
- 175g softened unsalted Butter
- 175g Caster Sugar
- ½ tsp Vanilla Extract
- 3 Eggs, beaten
- 175g SR Flour
- ½ tsp Baking Powder
- 50g Ground Almonds
- 1 large ripe Pear (approximately 300g)
- 2 tbsp Milk
For the glaze
- Apricot Conserve, sieved
Method
- Grease and line a 20cm round springform cake tin. Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 4/180°C.
- Cream together the butter, sugar and vanilla extract for a couple of minutes until light and fluffy, then gradually beat in the eggs.
- Combine the flour, baking powder and almonds and fold into the mixture.
- Peel and core the pear. Thinly slice one quarter and finely chop the remainder.
- Fold the chopped pear into the cake batter with enough milk to give a soft dropping consistency.
- Transfer the mixture into the prepared tin. Do not worry about levelling the surface; instead, arrange the pear slices over the top, pressing down gently so that they are still visible, but lie in the batter.
- Bake for 1–1¼ hours until risen, golden and set or until an inserted skewer comes out clean.
- Brush the surface of the cake with apricot conserve and leave to cool in the tin.
This recipe is from Cakes by Liz Herbert and published by Simon & Schuster 2009.