Central Otago is the perfect place to find walnuts and pears late winter/early spring. All the roadside stalls offer both and still trust that you will respect the honesty box payment system.
In this recipe we used packham pears and freshly shelled walnuts. Walnuts taste completely different when they are fresh out of the shell, not bitter like their supermarket counterparts can be.
Cake batter
- 250g unsalted butter, chopped
- 6 pears, peeled, cored and sliced thinly
- 2 cups caster sugar
- 2 free range eggs, lightly beaten
- 2 ½ cups plain flour
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 2 tsp ground ginger
Crumble
- 70g unsalted butter, softened and chopped
- ¼ cup brown sugar packed down
- 1 Tbsp flour
- ½ cup walnuts, roughly chopped
Method
- Preheat oven to 170°C and grease a 26cm cake tin lined with baking paper.
- Melt butter in a large saucepan.
- Take off heat and add sugar, pears and eggs. Stir to combine.
- Sift in flour, soda, baking powder and spices. Fold into mixture gently trying not to over mix.
- Pour batter into prepared cake tin and bake for 45 minutes.
- While the cake is cooking mix the butter, sugar and flour using your fingers.
- When the mixture resembles breadcrumbs stir in the walnuts.
- After 45 minutes of cooking, remove the cake from the oven and sprinkle with the crumble mixture.
- Place cake back into oven and cook for a further 30 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. Sprinkle with icing sugar and serve with vanilla ice cream.
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