Spiced Pear Cake (47 cents/serving)

Enjoy in-season pears in this delicious, Spiced Pear Cake. It mixes up quickly and serves as a perfect snack or dessert any day of the week. Its elegance is only surpassed by how easy it is to make!

Assemble a beautiful fall dessert table with Bilbo’s Seed Cakes, Apple Cinnamon Muffins, and Cranberry Chocolate Chip Snack Cake alongside this stunning Pear Cake.

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You see that pears are on sale at the store this week. I mean, they’re practically on perpetual sale it would seem, at the low price of only 99 cents per pound. But, besides eating them fresh, what should you do with them?

Bake them into cake, that’s what!

Pear Cake is incredibly easy to prepare, and THIS Spiced Pear Cake is the perfect pear dessert. Its impressive presentation makes it the ideal candidate for sharing with guests or taking to an event, but it’s simple enough to turn into an afterschool snack for the kids.

Why Make This

Pears are always affordable. You can enjoy pear cake twelve months out of the year since pears are almost always offered at an affordable price. Bonus: you only need two pears!

It’s an easy recipe. The batter mixes up easily in minutes and bakes up beautifully.

This is a delicious pear cake. Whenever I make this cake, it disappears in a matter of minutes. Minutes! You just might need to bake two.

Ingredients

Here’s what you need to make Pear Cake:

flour – I like to use unbleached, all-purpose flour. You can also use whole wheat pastry flour if you like.

baking powder – You definitely need the baking powder to give some lift to the cake.

lemon zest – Lemon is a nice foil for the pear. You can also use other citrus zest if you prefer.

spices: ground cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger – These warm spices add a wonderful flavor to the pear cake. If you have apple pie spice or pumpkin pie spice, you can use that instead.

salt – Salt is usually necessary to most baked goods. Don’t leave it out.

butter – I love baking with butter, but you can use margarine or other plant-based butter if you like. 

sugar – I use granulated sugar in this recipe, but you could use brown sugar if you prefer.

eggs – You just need two for this recipe, but you can use Flaxseed Meal Egg Substitute if needed.

vanilla extract – Vanilla adds great flavor to the pear cake. It’s cheaper to make your own vanilla extract than buy a commercial extract. You can use another extract if you prefer, such as almond or rum.

pears – The best pears for baking are Bosc red pear, red and green D’Anjou pears, and Bartlett. These hold their form and tend not to brown. See the variations below for other fruits you can use.

Variations

There are lots of ways to shop your kitchen and make this recipe your own. Consider these variations to pear cake:

• other fruit can be substituted for the sliced pears, such as thinly sliced apples, peaches, plums, or apricots, as well as halved and pitted cherries, whole blueberries, raspberries, or cranberries.
• cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg can be replaced by apple pie or pumpkin spice blends.
• orange, grapefruit, or lime zest can be used instead of the fresh lemon zest.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Here’s how to make the pear cake:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Grease a 9-inch springform pan and line it with parchment paper.

2. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, zest, ¼ teaspoon cinnamon, salt, nutmeg, and ginger.

3. In another large mixing bowl, cream together the butter and ¾ cup sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time. Blend in the vanilla.

4. Add the flour mixture and blend until well combined. Do not overmix.

5. Spread the batter into the prepared pan. Place the pear slices in a circle around the surface of the cake, spacing about ½-inch apart.

In a small bowl, combine the remaining ¼ teaspoon cinnamon and the 1 tablespoon sugar. Sprinkle this mixture over the pears.

Bake the cake for about 30 to 35 minutes or until a tester comes out with a few crumbs attached.

Cut around the cake to loosen it from the sides of the pan. Release the sides of the springform pan. Cool on a rack.

Recipe Costs

Knowing how much it costs you to prepare a recipe can help you decide if it’s the type of recipe to make regularly or one you might want to save for special occasions. Let’s crunch some numbers and see how this recipe pencils out.

• flour – $0.19
• baking powder – $0.09
• lemon zest – $0.10
• spices: ground cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger – $0.09
• salt – $0.01
• butter – $0.92
• granulated sugar – $0.16
• eggs – $0.30
• vanilla extract – $0.67
• pears – $1.23

Your costs may vary depending on where you shop and at what prices, but you can expect to spend $3.76 for the ingredients to bake this Pear Cake, about 47 cents/serving, so much less than you’d pay at the bakery!

Save Even More

You know I don’t typically want to make something if I can’t make it good as well as cheap. Here are some of the strategies you can use to make this recipe more economical:

• Stock up on ingredients when they are on sale. When I find regular kitchen staples on sale, I buy a lot. I’m currently using a price book to track prices and that’s saving me money. For this recipe, keeping an eye on the price of flour, butter, and spices can help keep the price down. And of course, stock up on pears when they’re at a great price!
• Buying in bulk – I also have gotten into the habit of buying cases of flour from Bob’s Red Mill or VitaCost so that I always have baking supplies on hand.

FAQs

Great Pear Recipes

This post was originally published on October 15, 2011. It has been updated for content and clarity.