I’m a huge fan of quick and easy cakes that use the best, seasonal produce. One of said cakes, my Easy Rhubarb Cake is one of the most popular recipes on the blog! I have a feeling this Easy Pear and Fresh Ginger Cake might soon follow suit!
This cake is one of the uncomplicated ones, ready for the oven in about 10 minutes and you don’t even need a mixer. To prepare the batter I’ve used the same method as for most of my muffin recipes. All you need is two bowls – one for dry and one for wet ingredients, combine two together gently without overmixing and you are well on your way.
The combination of fresh, juicy, seasonal pears and fresh, spicy ginger is absolutely divine! Add to it my favourite spice of all time – cinnamon and you are in heaven! I have seen recipes for pear and ginger cakes before but it wasn’t until I got some pears in my weekly fruit and veg box couple of weeks ago that I actually thought about making one myself! I’m so glad I did!
Quick word about ingredients!
The pears I used were still quite firm and as they were on the small side, I have only quartered them. If your pears are bigger you might want to get couple of slices per each quarter, it’s entirely up to you. Personally, I do prefer thicker, chunkier slices here.
I decided to go for grated fresh ginger instead of the ground variety for that fresher and spicier flavour! It worked a treat! I thought that two teaspoons of fresh ginger will make for quite a spicy cake but it wasn’t the case. All you get with that amount is gentle warmth and flavour of ginger so if you want some serious spice you might want to up the quantity to 3 teaspoons or alternatively add some ground ginger spice too. I think grated or really finely chopped stem ginger would work really well too!
I would really encourage you to try this super easy cake for yourself and with the abundance of seasonal pears around, there really isn’t any reason not to! It is perfect on its own (well nice cuppa wouldn’t go amiss) but if you’re after more elaborate dessert, simply add a scoop or two of good vanilla ice cream!
Some more bakes you might enjoy:
Dorset Apple Cake (Traybake) – moist and smelling of apples & cinnamon, delicious!
Best Buttery Apple Pie with a Twist – classic but with extra dimension of flavour and texture added to it!
Italian Plum & Almond Cake with Amaretti Crunch – if you love using ground almonds in combination with seasonal fruit this one is for you!
Healthier Date and Banana Flapjacks would make perfect addition to any lunch box or as an after school snack too!
Easy No Bake Stem Ginger Cheesecake – gently spicy and so wonderfully creamy, it’s a dream!
Melt In Your Mouth Almondy Mince Pies– perfect festive treats with most delicious, crumbly and buttery pastry ever made with the addition of some ground almonds!
Easy Pear and Fresh Ginger Cake
Ingredients
- 180 g plain flour or white spelt flour or mixture of both
- 95 ml full fat plain yogurt
- 95 ml rapeseed or olive oil
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp freshly grated ginger or more for extra spice
- 130 g light brown sugar
- 3 large eggs
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 6 small pears (approx 400g) cored, peeled and quartered
- 1 Tbsp Demerara sugar to sprinkle over the top
Non-stick 20cm/8inches cake or springform tin (bottom lined with baking paper)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas Mark 4.
- Put flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and sugar in a large bowl and mix gently with a whisk. Alternatively, sieve all the dry ingredients with the exception of sugar onto a large bowl, add sugar and give your dry ingredients a quick mix to incorporate sugar.
- In another bowl mix together yogurt, oil, eggs and freshly grated ginger.
- Make a well in the middle of your dry ingredients and pour in wet ingredients mixture. Fold in gently until fully incorporated but don't overmix. Pour in your batter onto prepared cake tin.
- Arrange sliced pears gently on top of the cake batter, pushing them in ever so slightly. Sprinkle over some Demerara sugar and bake in the preheated oven for approx 40 min or until skewer inserted in the centre of the cake comes out clean.
- Take your cake out of the oven and let it cool slightly in the tin before taking it out onto the rolling rack. Serve as is or with some vanilla ice cream! Enjoy!
Notes
- Nutritional information is approximate and meant as a guideline only.
- You could substitute freshly grated ginger with the same amount of grated or really finely chopped stem ginger.
- For more of a spice kick feel free to increase the amount of ginger to 3 tsp or add a teaspoon of ground ginger to your dry ingredients.
- Feel free to keep pear slices as thin or as chunky as you like. My pears were rather small and quartering them gave me small yet chunkier slices which worked really nice with a lovely fruit bite in each slice of the cake.
Nutrition
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I’m linking my Easy Pear and Fresh Ginger Cake recipe with the following pages:
Cook Blog Share hosted this week by Jacqui at Recipes Made Easy
Cook Once Eat Twice hosted by Corina at Searching for Spice
Baking Crumbs hosted by myself and Jenny at Apply To Face Blog
Bake of the Week hosted by Jenny over at Mummy Mishaps
Kate says
Hi Jo! This cake looks so delicious! I absolutely love ginger! I wonder could i arrange the pears in concentric rings at the base of the cake, then pour the batter over, and bake in same way – then tip out upside down – do you think that would work just as well?
For a dessert, would it be nice served warm with hot caramel sauce and fresh dollop of cream, or would that be too much do you think?
joskitchenlarder says
Hi Kate, I’m so pleased you like the look of the cake. I don’t see why making it more into upside down cake wouldn’t work, you can definitely give it a try. Make sure you don’t forget generous sprinkle of demerara sugar first before you arrange your pears, that should give you lovely caramelisation. As for the accompaniments, I think you can really go to town here and serve it with whatever you fancy. Hot caramel sauce and cream sound lovely. I hope you enjoy the cake and please let me know how it turned out. 🙂
Kat (The Baking Explorer) says
Pear and ginger are such a fabulous combination, your cake looks amazing!
Mayuri Patel says
my mouth is literally watering looking at the so delicious, soft fruity cake. With ginger flavor, its just the right kind of dessert for a cold evening. Would love it with some hot custard.
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you so much Mayuri! 🙂 It is a perfect cold weather cake and some hot custard would definitely work a treat. 🙂
Jenny walters says
Goodness this looks incredible. Warm fruited cakes with cream is perhaps my favourite dessert of all time. So I’m off to pin this beaut xx
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you Jenny 🙂 Mmm, cream is definitely another delicious serving option. 🙂 xx
Anna@onceuponafoodblog.com says
I love rustic autumn cakes like this and the addition of fresh ginger sounds gorgeous. I think I’ll have mine warm with custard!
joskitchenlarder says
Aww thank you Anna! 🙂 Warm slice with some custard sounds just the ticket! 🙂
Jenny Paulin says
this looks perfect Jo. I too love an easy cake that incorporates fruit and spice and looks so tempting too. I wouldn’t mind trying a slice……or two!
Thank you for linking to #BakeoftheWeek x
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you so much Jenny! 🙂 I am a little bit in love with this cake at the moment lol x
Anca says
Your cake has a lovely texture and some really delicious sounding flavours. Delish!
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you Anca! It was devoured in a day and I’ve got request for more as soon as fruit and veg delivery box lands on our doorstep with some more pears! 🙂
Choclette says
Oh my, that does look good Jo. I can attest pear and ginger work wonderfully well together. Love these sort of bakes and yours looks totally scrumptious. #CookBlogShare
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you Choclette! I saw so many cake recipes before with pears and ginger and thought they sounded really good but it took me a while to give it a go myself! I really don’t know what I was waiting for! lol
Jacqui Bellefontaine says
I love the combination of Pear and ginger in a cake and this one looks delicious I could eat a slice now . Warm with icecream would be good.
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you Jacqui! They do work so well together and yes I wish I had some left for little mid week dessert too! 🙂
mimi rippee says
Pear and ginger are such a wonderful combination. And the cake is obviously moist, which I love. Wondering if crystallized ginger bits would add something as well?
joskitchenlarder says
Thanks Mimi! I would say you can add stem or crystallised ginger instead of or together with fresh root ginger for that extra kick. Both stem and crystallised ginger will add some texture and sweetness too. I think that would be the main difference and I think it would work quite nice. I went for simplicity with this one but might go for some chopped stem ginger when I bake it next time.
Corina Blum says
This cake looks delicious Jo! I think it would be fantastic served warm as a dessert too. I’m craving some now in fact! Thanks for sharing with #CookOnceEatTwice
joskitchenlarder says
Thank you Corina! I was so happy with how it turned out! In fact, I have got some more pears coming in this week’s fruit and veg box so I can make it again! 🙂