apple, pear and ginger pudding cake

When is a cake a pudding?  Probably when it’s my apple, pear and ginger pudding cake. This is one of those cakes that started off with intentions of being a proper cake and swiftly turned into the kind of pudding that your spoon warm directly out of the cake tin and serve with lashings of cream or custard.

Yes, it’s January and we’re trying to be good but also it’s January and it’s gloomy and miserable and all I want to do is eat pudding.  So I am.

• 225g butter – soft
• 225g caster sugar
• 125g self-raising flour
• 50g ground almonds
• 50g wholemeal flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon real vanilla paste such as the brilliant Little Pod Vanilla
•  3 large free-range eggs – lightly beaten
• 1 pear – peeled, cored and chopped
• 1 apple – peeled, cored and chopped
• 4 nuggets of crystallised ginger – chopped

I’m using my small 26cm enamel pie dish from Falcon Enamel.  It’s probably the equivalent of a 1lb loaf tin but to be honest any kind of pudding bowl and cake tin would work because you’re not ‘turning it out’ and so therefore doesn’t need to be precise.  Grease it well with butter.

I’m using my smeg stand mixer with a beater paddle but a hand-held mixer would work or even a wooden spoon if you’ve got the strength and courage!

Combine the flours and sieve through the baking powder – set aside.

Cream the butter and sugar for a good 5 mins until they’re pale and fluffy, then add half the combined flours and half the beaten eggs and beat in for 1 minutes, then add the rest of the flours and eggs along with the vanilla and beat for another minute until it’s all combined.

Fold through the apples, pears and ginger.

Spoon the batter into the tin and bake on 170C for 35-45 mins or until the cake is golden and springy to touch. Set aside onto a wire rack until completely cool.

For more cake recipes check these out on Dom in the Kitchen

Eat and of course, enjoy!