When it comes to holiday baking, it’s always hard to choose a favourite. But if there was a flavour profile I absolutely adore at this time of year and find myself gravitating towards time and time again, it would have to be all things spiced. If you’ve been here for the last few years, you would have seen my Molasses Spiced Cake. Still a favourite and one that I will definitely be baking again this year.
But I thought I would kick off the holiday baking season with something a little less quintessentially holiday – a Spiced Pear Cake, with Butterscotch Sauce.
The cake pulls together some of my all time favourite fall flavours – pear, cardamon, and cloves, in a nutty almond filling. While, totally delicious on it’s own, the butterscotch sauce takes it to the next level. Ooey gooey goodness. The perfect accompaniment to an afternoon cup of coffee or tea.
Ingredients
Cake
3/4 cup + 2 tbsp butter, softened
1 cup sugar
4 eggs
2/3 cup plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cardamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1 cup almond meal
2 ripe bosc pears
2 teaspoons sugar, extra
Butterscotch Sauce
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3 tbsp butter
1 cup pure cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
Directions
Preheat oven to 325°F. Grease a 9″ cake that is deep (about 7cm). Line the base with parchment paper.
Using an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating after each addition (mixture may curdle). Sift flour, baking powder and mixed spice over butter mixture. Add almond meal. Fold until combined.
Spoon mixture into prepared cake pan. Smooth out the top with a spatula. Cut pears into quarters. Remove core and thinly slice each quarter. Arrange over cake, overlapping slightly. Sprinkle with extra sugar. B
ake for 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. The top of the cake starts to brown too quickly, cover with foil. Once done, let the cake sit in pan for 10 minutes. Then turn, top-side up, onto a wire rack
To make the Butterscotch sauce, place sugar, butter, cream and vanilla in a pan over medium heat. Cook, stirring, for 4 minutes or until sugar dissolves. Bring to the boil. Reduce heat to low. Simmer for 5 minutes or until thickened and delicious. Drizzle the sauce over a slice of cake and enjoy!
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