On Saturday I went to make a pear and ginger upside-down cake that I'd seen a delicious-looking recipe for in the last few weeks but I was unable to find the recipe. I trawled through blogs I might have seen it on and flicked through books and magazines I'd read recently in the hope of finding it... but it's still a mystery and I'm thinking I may have just dreamt about it.
Instead, I used "Ester's gingerbread" from Ruth Pretty with a few tweaks to create what I had in my mind. It really is THE BEST gingerbread. Lovely and moist and equally good with a chunk of creamy blue or in this case, pears, walnuts and a spoonful of softly whipped cream.
I made the full recipe (nearly half a block of butter...eeek) but distributed it into two loaf tins instead of one as per the recipe. In one (baking paper-lined) tin I spread a mixture of 25g butter and 50g brown sugar (melted gently together over a low heat), 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts, and two finely-sliced, peeled and quartered buerre bosc pear.
Although the upside-down brown sugar bit went slightly toffee-ish, it made a delicious winter pudding with a little cream on the side. It was even better the next day reheated with a drizzle of golden syrup.
For the second loaf, I poured the remaining batter into the tin and dotted in a cup or so of diced pear. This made a good "tin-filler" and lasted several days as a treat to have with a cup of tea.
this looks perfect for all the rainy weather we've been having lately. And slightly toffee-ish upside-down brown sugar actually sounds delicious in its own right!
ReplyDeleteWait a minute, didn't I get this recipe from you guys? http://nostalgic-nana.blogspot.com/2010/09/good-intentions.html
ReplyDeleteIf you keep old "Cuisine" magazines, there's a great recipe for Pear & Walnut gingerbread with butterscotch sauce by Ray McVinnie in Issue 111 from July 2005! One of my favourite combinations though and yours looks lovely texture and moist.
ReplyDeleteyum, double treats!
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