I woke up this morning thinking about what to bake with the last of my pears, (I say last even though there are still several on my counter.) I opened my email and saw a recipe for a spiced applesauce cake, it looked so good that I decided to do a spin-off using pears. I made a quick batch of pearsauce, I didn’t mill them this time, I just mashed them up a bit.
I also cut the sugar back and adjusted the spicing slightly. I used fresh ginger instead of powdered and added a bit of lemon zest to the batter.
There was a bit or pearsauce leftover so I served the cake with a spoonful of that as well as some whipped cream.
For the cake:
Cream together…
1 stick butter
1 scant cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp fresh grated ginger
zest of 1/2 lemon
Add…
2 farm fresh eggs, one at a time.
Beat in…
1 3/4 cups pearsauce (or unsweetened applesauce)
Mix together in a separate bowl…
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 – 3/4 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground clove
Slowly add dry ingredients to the applesauce mixture. Pour batter into a well-greased cake pan or square baking dish. Bake at 350* for about 35 minutes, until golden brown. Serve with pearsauce and whipped cream.