Recipe of the Week - Pear, Raspberry & Orange Cake {Wheat & Dairy Free}

Back in the autumn my mum was asked to take part in filming a few recipes for a Gaelic Cookery programme that is shown on BBC Alba.

The first couple of recipes were shown a couple of weeks ago, and you can watch the episode here if you want to see them.

Her two chosen recipes were: something with duck - I'm really not that keen on duck so I didn't pay that much attention to that one! - and this Pear & Raspberry cake.

I've adapted it to make it safe for our free from boys and also think that there needs to be mention of orange in the title as the orange flavour comes through quite strongly too.

The first week I made this we had it for pudding after dinner one evening, and it was so popular that I was asked to make another one for pudding a few nights later. Which was fine, as the recipe only uses half a tin of pears and it meant I could use up the rest of the pears!

Since it proved so popular in our house, and it is always popular whenever my mum makes it too, I thought it only fair to share a written down version of the cake.

It can be eaten warm as pudding with ice cream or cold with a cup of tea or coffee.

You will need:

2 eggs

6oz sugar + an extra 2 tsp

3oz dairy free margarine

75ml oat milk (or your own choice of suitable dairy free milk)

5oz Doves Farm Gluten Free Self Raising Flour

1 orange, zested

1 tsp baking powder

1 tin pear halves, you will need about three pear halves, sliced

about 100g raspberries, fresh or frozen

-Preheat the oven to 180C and line a square baking tin.

-Beat the eggs and sugar with an electric whisk for about 5 minutes until light and fluffy.

-Meanwhile, melt the margarine and milk in a pan.

-Cool just a little bit before pouring onto the eggs & sugar mix, still whisking.

-Add the flour, orange zest and baking powder and then fold in gently so that you don't knock out all the air you have whisked into the eggs. It is more like a batter mixture than a cake mixture so don't be alarmed if you think it looks thinner than a usual cake mix!

-Pour into your cake tin and then arrange the sliced pears in rows on top of the mixture. They will sink in! Then dot the raspberries around the mixture too.

-Sprinkle the extra 2tsp of sugar over the top and bake for around 20-25 minutes.

Recipe of the Week - Magic Lemon Pudding {Gluten & Dairy Free}

At this time of year, when the weather is so grey and the days feel like there has hardly been any daylight at all, it's hard to resist the lure of a comforting pudding.

We don't eat pudding every night of the week. Just on one or two week nights, but always on a Sunday. For week night puds I want something that I can rustle up pretty quickly, ideally something that I can throw in the food mixer and let it do the work while I get the next stage of dinner on the go.

That's what I love about this pudding, which came about as a result of re-vamping our old favourite, Magic Chocolate Pudding. (You can find the recipe for that one here.) All it takes is throwing the cake ingredients in the mixer, let it mix for a few minutes, scrape it into your dish and then pour the sauce mixture on top. After 20-30 minutes in the oven you have a pudding AND a sauce.

The revamp of the chocolate version didn't come about as a result of us being tired of it. Imagine the suggestion of me tiring of a chocolate pudding?! No, I decided to try something different as my husband would far rather a lighter, fruitier pudding than a really chocolatey one, so this one was concocted with him in mind, and I'm so pleased with how it turned out that I thought I'd share it here.

The lovely lemony zing from the sauce is perfect for lifting your spirits on a grey January day. I also think it would be lovely with a handful or two of blueberries stirred through the cake mix before it's baked, but one of our boys would seriously object to that so I haven't tried that yet!

You will need:
for the pudding
4oz dairy free margarine 4oz Doves Farm Wheat Free Self Raising Flour 4oz sugar 2 eggs zest of 2 lemons

for the sauce
4oz sugar juice of the 2 lemons made up to 350ml with boiling water

- Add the margarine, flour, sugar, eggs and lemon zest to a bowl and beat with a mixer for a few minutes until smooth.
- Spread into a dish about the depth of a brownie tin or thereabouts. I should really measure my dish but I suppose it must be about 2-3 inches deep? And about 30x20cm in length/width?
- Stir the sugar and lemon juice/water combination until the sugar has dissolved and then slowly pour over the cake mix.
- Put into a preheated oven at 180C for between 20-30 minutes. It should be golden brown and you will see the sauce bubbling up from the bottom around the edges.
-Serve with some dairy free ice cream.