Sticky Toffee and Pear pudding

Ah those old cook books – I read them sitting up in bed!

This one is  a great find – a book edited by Delia Smith (All Hail Delia!!) with recipes from some very famous people, and some who probably were famous in 1978, which is when the book was published.

I marked this recipe particularly, and a rainy Sunday with an Amber warning of Wind and a storm forecast for tomorrow gave me the time I needed to give it a go.

In this recipe, the toffee sauce blends into the pastry and gives you a lovely crunchy topping.  I knew it would be a good recipe..

Get your platform shoes and bellbottoms out – we’re off to 1978!!

EQUIPMENT:

• A 2lb (large) Loaf tin, with a ready-made liner inserted if you have one. Otherwise just butter and line it.
• A large mixing bowl
• 2 medium-sized bowls – I used large cereal bowls
• A potato peeler or a sharp knife
• A fine grater for zesting, and a larger grater for the butter.
• A small saucepan

INGREDIENTS: Makes enough for 6-8 people.

• 350g Self-raising Flour
• A pinch of salt
• 75 g unsalted butter, straight from the fridge
• 4 large pears – peeled and finely sliced – giving about 300g – any leftovers are the Cook’s treat! See NOTES about the pears
• a lemon
• 50g Caster sugar
• Fine zest of a large orange
• 1/2 a teaspoon of ground Ginger
• 100g dark brown sugar
• 50g butter

METHOD: There are several ‘bits’ to this recipe, and I think this is the best order to do them..

• Peel  and slice the pears, put them in a medium sized bowl, and sprinkle with the juice of half the lemon.
• Sift the flour and salt into the mixing bowl, and grate in 75g cold butter. Mix together and leave to one side.
• Mix the caster sugar, orange zest and ginger together in the 2nd medium-sized bowl
• Put the dark brown sugar – I used dark Muscovado – into the saucepan, add in the 50g butter and the juice from the second lemon half. leave to one side.
• Heat the oven to 160ºFan or equivalent.
• Put the liner into the loaf tin, and put on a metal tray.
• Add some very cold water – I used about 4 tablespoons – to the flour/butter mixture, and mix to make a firm dough.
• Roll this out on a well floured worktop, to make a rectangle which is about the length of your loaf tin (that’s 24cms in my kitchen) and about 20cms deep.
• Sprinkle the pear pieces evenly over the dough
• sprinkle over the orange zest mixture
• Roll up the filled dough to make a swiss-roll type shape, with the seam underneath, then pat it into shape.
• Lift it gently and place it in the prepared loaf tin, pop any bits that have fallen out into the open ends, then tuck them underneath too.
• Bake for 15 minutes.
• While that’s happening, heat the brown sugar, butter and lemon juice until the butter melts.
• let it bubble gently got a couple of minutes, then remove it from the heat.
• When the 15 minutes are up, remove the dish from the oven and pour over the toffee
• Return to the oven for 25 minutes at the same heat, until the top is browned and crunchy.
• Serve straight from the tin in slices.
• I like pouring cream with this, but custard (for Mr Sat. Night), or ice-cream would be delicious too!

NOTES:

• My Conference pears were really almost over-ripe. I used a potato peeler to get the skin off, and just sliced them into medium thick slices. If your pears are under-ripe – I suggest roughly grating them before cooking. The reason I deal with the pears first is because it’s the messiest bit!
• The lemon juice helps to keep the pears from browning but also enhances the flavour.
• The orange zest makes a huge difference to this pudding – I could really taste it.
• I imagine, although I haven’t tried it, that you could easily substitute the pears for grated Apples in this recipe. I’d probably exchange cinnamon for ginger too.