How I adore these small pears! I've been telling everybody that now you can get Finnish pears - go and get them before they ran out or the season is over.
I
decided to bake a pear cake with same recipe I made a plum cake. I got
the recipe from Nigel Slater's beautiful cooking book The Kitchen
Diaries. It is my absolutely fave book as I told you in previous blog
post where I told you about pork ribs we made with my husband from this very same book.
Gluten
free and dairy free baking has been very challenging for me. It is
always hard to get very good and moist result...until I found oat flour from grocery
shop. It's only what it is called - oat. Nothing else added.
PEAR CAKE RECIPE BY KREETTA (changing/using recipe from Nigel Slater's plum cake/The Kitchen Diaries book)
6-7 small pears
butter 150g
indian sugar 150g
eggs 3
oat flour 75g (gluten free)
baking powder 1 1/2 teaspoons
ground almond 100g
shelled walnuts 50g
You need a 20cm cake tin, about 6cm deep. Bake in 180 'C degrees about 35-45min.
Chop the walnuts and almonds. Beat the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Cut the pears at least in three but if you make them smaller they get more soft and that I recommend. Mine were too big so they could have been more softer...but in photograph they look very nice ;) Whip eggs lightly and add to the mixture. Mix flour+baking powder and add them gently into the mixture. Fold almonds and walnuts into the mixture.
Scrape the mixture into the cake tin. Place the pear pieces on the cake mixture. They will sink so it might not be so precise how you do it. Bake the cake. It's quite big so it's for 10-12 people.
When you are photographing food, it is good to know when it should be done. This time it was the right moment to photograph the cake before it went to oven. After that it changed color to brown - even though it's it ok and pretty - I think I like the green pears more.
This cake is tasty and moist. You can serve it with vanilla ice cream or without. I think you can also serve it people without saying it's gluten and dairy free. One cake for all. Of course if there are people with peanut allergy or they are vegan - then you have to change the plan. My piece of cake is on my favorite plate by Arabia. Of course it's vintage and the design is called Maisema (Landscape).
Have a great and creative weekend!
xoxo
Kreetta