Spiced pear butter cake

Rich, buttery spiced pear butter cake is an easy, delicious recipe perfect as a tea time treat served with a dollop of sweetened whippe cream.

It’s Friday and I could not be happier about it. Even when I have some work to do over the weekend, Fridays are always just my favourite. Fridays are like a big sigh of relief for me, especially when the week has been hectic. And before a weekend, I always try to bake something for us to feast on over the coming days and this week, I decided to use up some pears I had lying in the fridge in this simply scrumptious butter cake.

I mean technically this cake is a pretty classic pound cake but when I was little, we called it “Butter cake” because of the substantial amount of butter that goes into the batter. And that butter results in the most moreish cake you could imagine. I wanted to use a butter/pound cake batter for this because I needed something that could handle the wait of the chopped pears.

Because they are heavier than the batter, you can’t use a very light, airy batter which will result in a very delicate cake because the pears will just sink to the bottom and these type of cakes just don’t work with chunks of fruit in them. And yes, the pears will probably still do a little sinking even in this batter (coating them in a little flour before stirring them in will help), but I just found this cake to be much sturdier. I also think the butteriness of it compliments the sweet pears beautifully.

I decided to add some spices at the last minute because I simply love anything with pears or apples to have a little spice to it. I used some ground cinnamon, nutmeg, a teeny bit of clove and a pinch of ground cardamom to intensify the cake and add beautiful fragrance. Served with a hefty dollop of sweetened whipped cream, you’ll be hard pressed to find a more delightful weekend treat.

Spiced pear butter cake

Rich, buttery spiced pear butter cake is an easy, delicious recipe perfect as a tea time treat served with a dollop of sweetened whippe cream.

4.60 from 15 votes

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Course: Baked goods, Cake, Pound cake

Prep Time: 10 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 1 hour hour 15 minutes minutes

Total Time: 1 hour hour 25 minutes minutes

Author: Alida Ryder

Ingredients

• 250 g butter room temperature
• 250 g sugar
• 4 eggs
• 250 g flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• pinch each ground cloves and ground cardamom
• pinch of salt
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 4 pears peeled, cored and chopped

to serve

• sweetened whipped cream

Instructions

• Pre-heat the oven to 180°c and line a 20cm cake pan with baking paper.
• Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy then beat in the eggs, one at a time.
• Sift together the flour, baking powder, spices and salt and in a separate jug, mix together the milk and vanilla.
• Add the flour and milk, alternating between the two, and mix well after each addition until the batter is thick and creamy.
• Coat the pear in 1 tablespoon of flour. Dust off the excess and mix into the batter.
• Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and place in the oven.
• Bake for 60-75 minutes until a skewer inserted comes out clean. If the cake is browning too fast, simply cover with a piece of foil.
• When the cake is baked, remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before serving with whipped cream.