Pear Cake (Using Fresh Whole Pears – No Peeling Necessary)
Pear cake will be your number one recipe for using fresh pears! Use the whole pear because no peeling is necessary which makes it super easy, and incredibly delicious. Everyone will ask for the recipe!
Get ready to bookmark this fresh pear cake recipe!
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What to do with lots of Pears?
Make pear cake! Once you make it once, you’re going to want to make this cake over and over again. How do I know? Because this recipe base which comes from this Sicilian whole orange cake is fabulous, no matter what fruit I use in it!
Most recently, I tried the cake with fresh apples and oh boy, it was fantastic. In fact, it kind of went viral and was one of my top recipes right after I posted it. The apple cake was so good, it inspired me to try a pear cake! It has a fabulous texture and is incredibly moist! The other reason everyone loves it is because it’s so darned easy to make! No need to peel the fresh pears in this recipe (but do use organic fruit for this reason).
Let me tell you, everyone who has tried the apple cake and the pear cake has raved about them! In fact, I recently made an apple and pear cake, using fresh apples and pears together (twice) and it was really good, too! I dropped one off for a friend and she said her family loved it and thanked me for the “amazing cake”!
Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the only thing you’ll want to make with pears as they are such a magnificent (and I think, underappreciated) fruit. You may remember my mother’s poached pears in wine recipe, well, this cake is almost as easy!
Can you Freeze Pear Cake?
Yes, you can absolutely freeze this fresh pear cake, as I’ve frozen all the fruit cakes made using this recipe and it freezes exceptionally well! I wouldn’t keep it in the freezer longer than a month, though.
I’ve since added another pear cake to my site, this delicious honey pear cake!
As you can see, my pears weren’t even close to being perfect, but the cake still tasted marvelous!
Let’s get to the recipe, shall we? You’re going to love it!
Pear Cake
slightly adapted from my apple cake recipe serves 10
FULL PRINTABLE RECIPE BELOW
Make the Batter
Prepare an 8″ springform pan by spraying with oil (or butter) and lining in parchment paper (sides optional, only if you want really clean sides), then spray the paper, too.
In a food processor, or blender, process the pear pieces (do not peel unless they’re not organic) and lemon juice. My pears were quite soft, so this puréed result is fine.
Place the sugar and eggs in a large bowl and beat with a mixer until light and fluffy. Sift the flour with the baking powder then add to the mixture in the bowl a little at a time along with the softened butter. Continue to mix until completely blended, then stir in the yogurt.
Add the processed pears to the cake batter along with vanilla, and stir until evenly combined.
That’s it, you’re done! Now pour the batter into the prepared pan.
Bake the Pear Cake
Place the tin into the preheated oven for 50-60 minutes (depending on your oven), but test with a cake tester or skewer to make sure the pear cake is done before removing from the oven. If desired, sprinkle lightly with some granulated, Demerara or raw sugar immediately. Allow to cool for about 15 minutes, then remove the side of the springform pan.
Serve the Pear Cake.
Let cool before cutting and serving.
You can really taste the pear (don’t be tempted to add spices before making this recipe as written first). Nothing wrong with eating a slice while it’s still a wee bit warm!
Or you can be more civilized and serve it on a plate with cutlery!
Any way you serve it-it’s fabulous!
And one last pear recipe for you from my friend, Cynthia: Poire Belle Hélène (poached pears with chocolate).
Pear Cake (Using Whole Pears - No Peeling Necessary)
Special Equipment
- 1 8" springform pan
- 1 food processor (or blender)
- 1 cake tester
Ingredients
- 3 large pears (organic)
- 1 Tbsp lemon juice
- 3 eggs
- 1 ⅛ cup sugar
- 1 ¾ cup all purpose flour (plain flour in the UK)
- 2 ½ tsp baking powder or 1 packet Italian Paneangeli vanilla baking powder
- ⅓ cup butter softened
- ⅓ cup plain Greek yogurt
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp sugar to sprinkle on top (optional)
Instructions
Make the Pear Cake Batter:
- Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C)
- Prepare an 8" springform pan by spraying with oil (or butter) and lining in parchment paper (sides optional, if you want really clean sides), then spray the paper, too.
- Wash, core and cut the pear(s) into pieces.
- In a food processor or blender, process the pear pieces and lemon juice until it is almost pureed.
- Place the sugar and eggs in a large bowl and beat with a mixer until light and fluffy. Sift the flour with the baking powder then add to the mixture in the bowl a little at a time along with the softened butter. Continue to mix until completely blended, then stir in the yogurt.
- Add the processed pears and vanilla to the cake batter and stir until evenly combined.
- Pour into prepared cake tin.
Bake the Cake:
- Bake for 50-60 minutes (depending on your oven), but test with a cake tester or skewer to make sure the pear cake is done before removing from the oven. If desired, sprinkle lightly with some granulated sugar immediately. Allow to cool for about 15 minutes, then remove the side of the springform pan.
- Let cool before cutting and serving.
- The cake can stand on its own, but you can also serve it with a fruit sauce, dollop of whipped cream, custard or vanilla ice cream. I prefer it plain with a cup of tea!
Notes
- Do not peel, but remove the core/seeds pears should be just ripe, not overly ripe, or underripe
- It's important to weigh ingredients in this recipe.
Nutrition
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Can you use a regular bread pan and line the sides with parchment paper instead of a spring form pan?
Hi Vicki, I’ve made this cake in loaf pans, round pans, bundt pans and they all turn out great, so I say yes! :) It’s such a great recipe (very forgiving)! Let me know how it turns out!
Great recipe! Thank you. I made mine into muffins and baked them 23-25 minutes. Delicious!
I would like to try this using canned pears. I have 8 cans of canned pears and zero fresh pears. as long as I weigh it to 330 grams it should work right? or will the absence of peel change the consistency?
I have just made this cake. I used pears that were just beginning to ripen, so not too wet at all. When I added the pears to the cake batter, the batter curdled from the lemon juice. I have some coffee cake recipes that do that too and it’s not a problem. I did find the texture to be a bit grainy and wondered if that was normal. The flavour was nice, more like a coffee cake than a sweet, sugary cake. It will be nice with tea!
My daughter sent this recipe to me after making it and raving about it. I want to make it for a family gathering, and wonder how I would make it w/gluten free flour.
Would it be possible for you to publish the ingredient list in US measurements for those of us without scales and not familiar with metric. Thank you in advance…I am looking forward to making this.
Hi Sue, thanks for asking as I hadn’t realized that I didn’t have cups on this recipe. HOWEVER, I highly, highly recommend investing in an inexpensive kitchen scale (they’re as cheap as $10 on Amazon) because 1. cups are ALWAYS inaccurate, and 2. it’s impossible to get 300 g of pear by using cups and that’s the only way to know if you have the right amount. Honestly, digital scales are so easy to use. Just press a button, add your item and it tells you the weight. You’ll be delighted (btw, we’re really the outlier in not using scales compared to the rest of the world). I hope you give them a try (and I refuse to add cups to certain recipes because of the failure rate using them in making my doughnuts and pizza dough). Let me know if you give it a go.
Lovely cake, but I am not super confident in my mixing technique and wondering if it should be turning out any lighter for me. I am new to the eggs/sugar creaming method and wondering if you can be more specific about how you add the butter: is it melted/cooled or just soft, and are you adding it after the flour or alternating with the flour? Also are you still using the mixer at this point or combining by hand?
Many thanks! I am looking forward to trying with apples and oranges next.
Hi Emily, it’s not a light cake, but it’s rather unique in its texture. While not dense, it’s definitely more heavy than light. This recipe is so forgiving that I think any way you add the butter would be fine, however, I add it when it’s soft (or I would say add it when melted). Re: the flour “…add to the mixture in the bowl a little at a time along with the softened butter.” so yes, add flour, then some butter, then flour, then butter (so it doesn’t curdle). Hope this helps, but like I said, it’s a very forgiving recipe so you should get good results no batter how you add it, :)
Hi, Christina- Thanks, this does help. I think it’s probably coming out about right then. Love the almost caramelized browned edges.
I came across this recipe and thought I’d make it for a potluck lunch. Unfortunately the batter was far too wet and was still pretty raw 1 hour and 20 minutes into baking. I’m in the UK so used weight measurements with digital scales, rather than cups. I’m not sure where I went wrong, but would suggest maybe erring on the side of caution and only use 2 pears (I used 3). I’m sure it’s a lovely recipe when it works.
Hi Lucy, I don’t know why this happened, but like another reader, sounds like you maybe used really wet, ripe pears and didn’t weigh them? If you’re advising on using 2 instead of 3, pears can vary in size/weight, so to be sure, they should weigh 300g. I have never used super wet/ripe pears or unripe, dry pears, so I have to specify that the pears should be in between these phases of ripeness. It is a lovely recipe, and sorry yours didn’t turn out as it should.
Brilliant recipe. Successfully prepared abd enjoyed by many .Sydney, Australia
Love to hear this, thank you so much, Bryan!