Fresh pear cake

Sometimes my eyes are just too hungry!   And when my eyes are hungry, I buy too much.  I am a lover of all fruit, tutti fruiti!   You name it – there’s not a fig, berry, stone fruit, pome, citrus, tropical, melon, seed-in or seedless piece of fruit that I’ve tried whose flesh and nectar doesn’t excite me!  Be it fresh, stewed, in a tart or pie, creamed, sorbeted, preserved, jammed, compoted, frozen or flambéed – if it’s fruit, count me in! 

So it was with the pears recently.  I found myself with a cornucopia in the fruit bowl, ripe and ready to be eaten.  Juicy and aromatic, but too many for the two of us, they were a perfect excuse for me to kick into baking gear!   

Pears and ginger are in combination with cinnamon and pecans in this cake.  I prefer my ginger fresh and always have a piece in the refrigerator.  I grate it using a handy zester called a microplane.  Peel the ginger and press firmly as you grate to cut the fibers.  This moist cake is easy to make and remains fresh for several days.

Fresh Pear Cake

Adapted from Allrecipes

• 4 cups peeled, cored and diced pears (about 3-4)
• 1 cup granulated sugar, divided use
• 2 –3 teaspoons freshly grated ginger root (or 1 teaspoon ground ginger)
• 2 ¾  cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3 eggs
• 2/3 cup canola oil
• 1 cup pecans, toasted and chopped

Combine the pears, 1/2 cup sugar and ginger in a large bowl and let stand for an hour.  Combine flour, salt, baking soda and cinnamon in another bowl and set aside.

Preheat oven to 325°F.  Spray a 10 inch Bundt pan with non-stick baking spray.

Beat eggs and remaining 1/2 cup sugar in stand mixer (or with a hand mixer) until pale and creamy.  Add oil and blend in slowly.  On low speed, blend in the flour mixture until most of the flour is mixed in.  Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula.  Add the pears and pecans and stir on slow speed until just incorporated into the batter.  Do not overbeat.

Pour batter into Bundt pan.  Bake at 325°F, checking after 50 minutes.  When a skewer comes out clean, remove cake from oven and cool on rack for 10 minutes.  Invert cake on a large plate and slide it back onto the rack to cool completely.  Sprinkle the top with confectioner’s (icing) sugar, using a sieve to distribute it evenly.

Enjoy a slice with a cup of tea, coffee or a glass of cold milk!

Prijatno!

Twittering and a blue cheese dressing

It all began with the chirping of chimney swifts in the chimney during the storm last night, and a cacophony of mocking birds twittering at the crack of dawn this morning.  I should be complimentary to my feathered friends because they did make pretty music, but I wasn’t quite ready to emerge from my sweet slumber!  The twittering must have been a sign…

I don’t have a picture of my outdoor twitters, but here’s a cutie from my Delft jar:

Later this morning, I read my dear neighbor Carolina’s blog.  Her remarkable husband, Gabe, was her guest blogger.  I’m not complimenting him only because he helps me with my computer issues;  he is also very smart and a wonderful husband and father.  After reading his entertaining post about the dubious cuisine of Nigeria (he works there on rotation), I followed a link to his blog and before I knew it, I became a Twitterer  -  not to be confused with Twit, OK?!    

Twittering is taking over as the new form of social communication.  Snippets (140 characters or less) of information are sent by the ‘twitter’ to followers in the cyber world and if the service is also connected to their cell phones, it’s transferred immediately.  Oprah has over half a million followers!  President Obama ‘twittered’ during the campaign and Lance Armstrong ‘tweets’ several times a day.  One of NASA’s astronauts will tweet about his training for an upcoming mission.  No news on whether he will be tweeting from space, though.  Time Magazine and CNN tweet to thousands of followers about news updates as they occur.   As you can see, the possibilities are endless!

On to the subject of food!  A couple of days ago I made a delicious blue cheese dressing and served it on a wedge of iceberg lettuce.  The ‘wedge’ salad has been all the rage the last few years, but I could barely finish it – the iceberg was tasteless and watery and simply not worthy of the blue cheese.  Perhaps the lowly iceberg’s role should remain a supporting one:  to complement the spice in chalupas and tacos, and add crunch and balance to a salty BLT  (in my most humble opinion, of course).

Yesterday, I composed a salad worthy of the remainder of the blue cheese dressing: curly red tip lettuce, avocado slices, hickory smoked bacon, and slices of ripe, juicy pears and radishes.  All of that was topped with snipped chives and freshly ground pepper. 

The dressing is thick, so I suggest you leave some moisture on the lettuce after you rinse it.  That way, when you toss the salad, the consistency will be perfect.  The pictures were taken before I tossed the salad, hence the mounds of dressing.  It would be great as a dip for veggies and crackers as well.

Blue Cheese Dressing from The Best American Recipes 2003-2004

1/2 cup mayonnaise

½ cup sour cream

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

½ cup crumbled blue cheese 

Stir mayonnaise and sour cream together.  Add Worcestershire sauce and blue cheese. Use a fork to mash the blue cheese to blend it in, leaving some chunks.  Keep refrigerated until use.

All a-twitter,

Prijatno!

Tuesdays With Dorie!

French Pear Tart

As a regular listener of NPR, I was introduced to Dorie Greenspan and her love of baking a few years ago. She was very generous to share her prized recipes on the air, and I must have been the first to hit the website, print and bake. Her recipe for rugelach is still a favorite. Ms. Greenspan has since published her 9th cookbook, Baking: From my kitchen to yours, now my favorite source for sweet things! The book includes interesting anecdotes of Ms. Greenspan baking in a modest New York home when she was a young girl, to working with the likes of the highly esteemed Julia Child, Pierre Herme and Daniel Boulud!

My dearest, sweetest neighbor, Carolina, recommended I join Tuesdays with Dorie. It didn't take much coaxing and fortunately the group opened to new members recently. So here I am, a baker at heart, doing what I enjoy most - sharing my experiences from the book with you. And I'm sure the neighbors on our short cul-de-sac won't mind either!

Ms. Greenspan herself chose the recipe for this week: French Pear Tart, on page 368. Being somewhat of a Francophile, I was very pleased and pulled out my collection of tart pans (which recently doubled, thanks to my generous friend, Deb). I chose a rectangular one, as you can see!

The pastry was easy to make, baked beautifully and retained its shape. The filling was fluffy and delicious with the addition of finely ground almonds. The only problem I encountered was finding fresh pears. You see, I Iive in the burbs, and quality is sometimes suspect. My fresh pears turned to mush and were brown on the inside when I poached them. They were duly tossed! Fortunately, Ms. Greenspan also recommended canned pears (which the French most commonly use). I am not a fan of canned foods, but Del Monte came through in a pinch! The pears were firm enough to slice and baked up beautifully.

Ms. Greenspan recommends eating this tart the same day it is baked, but I'm saving it for a special occasion tomorrow where I will share it with my family and friends. And to you, I recommend you go out and buy the book now, and join in the fun! Bon Appetit and

Prijatno!