Easy Peasy Pear and Almond Cake

Hi All!

I feel life is too short to not eat good food, and for me I like dessert, a lot! But, it is important to eat well. Here is a Pear & Almond Cake that is easy to whip up and is pretty healthy!

It is based on one of my clients favourite cakes, The Wacky Cake, thanks for introducing me Theresa!! I of course made it my own.

This is an adaptable cake recipe, the original one was a chocolate cake. Add in your own flare of different spices or fruit. I hope you like it!

Easy Peasy Pear and Almond Cake

Ingredients:

1 cup Unbleached Flour (I also used Spelt Flour and it works well)

1/2 cup Almond Meal

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp Baking Soda

2 tsp cinnamon + a bit for the top

1/2 cup date paste (1 cup fitted dates soaked in boiling water for 30 minutes then processed smooth in a food processor, keep the remaining in a jar for later use)

1/2 cup coconut sugar

1/3 cup oil (I used melted organic coconut oil but olive oil works nicely)

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp almond extract

1 cup water

1 tsp white vinegar (don’t omit as this is how your cake will rise)

2 pears peeled, cored and chopped

1/4 c silvered almonds

Method:

1) Preheat your oven to 350F

2) Mix all your dry ingredients together in a bowl (flour, almond meal, baking soda, spices and salt)

3) Mix all your wet in a separate bowl (date paste, sugar, vanilla, almond extract, water, pears {hold back a handful of chopped pears for the top}, white vinegar)

4) Grease an 8”x 8” baking dish

5) Combine the wet and dry, mix until combined and pour into prepared dish

6) Sprinkle top with silvered almonds, a handful of reserved pears and a bit of cinnamon

7) Bake for 35-40 mins

8) Enjoy

• The benefits of this cake is it has all the flavour but it’s not overly sweet. The dates help sweeten it so there is less sugar used in this recipe.

• The flour can be any you choose, I have used spelt and whole wheat, both work well. The whole wheat flour does give this cake a healthier taste.

• Pears are also naturally sweet but also contain fibre, a good amount of potassium, manganese and selenium. Pears have good detoxification properties too!

• The coconut oil is better than butter but we still need to watch our intake

• Almonds are a good source of essential fatty acids, high in Vitamin E and some of the B vitamins.

Just a note: I did try this recipe without oil and substituted unsweetened apple sauce for the oil and used 1 cup of date paste and no other sugar. The cake was good but definitely tasted healthy. This recipe is very versatile and I encourage you to make it your own!! Let me know how you did!!