This delightful pear and almond cake is my take on an Italian classic – a light sponge brimming with fresh fruit and studded with crisp almonds.

You know a cake is good when it’s just as good on a rainy day with a cuppa tea as it is with a fancy quenelle of cream for an elegant dinner party!  This pear and almond cake ticks SO MANY boxes.  Fruity, sweet, moist, subtle, crisp and above all, heavenly.  Grand words I know but after 3 slices in a row (I kid you not) Phil can tell you just how much I’m not exaggerating!

And the best part is that it really couldn’t be easier.  I really want to get away from the misnomer that vegan baking is difficult, flavourless, not worth the effort and requires a tonne of weird, hard to find ingredients.  In the case of this sponge cake (and pretty much most of my recipes – there a couple of dodgy early ones where I was finding my vegan feet, we’ll not name and shame them) it’s simply not true.  Apart from the fact that there are no eggs – and not all non-vegan baking requires them anyway – and a plant based milk the ingredients and processes are exactly the same.

Let’s talk cake ingredients:

The classic Italian cake that my vegan version is based on usually has the pears added last, forming the top layer of the cake.  They can be sliced and arranged or simply peeled and halved so that they sit just proud of the top of the cake.  But I wanted to make sure you got a piece of juicy pear in pretty much every single bite.  So for this pear and almond cake I’ve chopped up the pears and mixed them into the sponge batter.  I also cook them before adding them in – I can’t stand hard crunchy bits of fruit in soft, delicate sponge.  It’s an extra step but so very worth it and I think it helps really bring out the pear flavour.

We’ve got two different types of almond going into this vegan sponge – ground and flaked.  For extra nutty almondy flavour.  The ground almonds go in the batter, giving a lighter cooked sponge cake texture.  The flaked almonds are sprinkled on top before baking so they give the most wonderful toasty crunch!

I’ve also used coconut sugar in the batter because I LOVE coconut sugar.  It gives everything a rich caramel flavour.  And it’s less refined than regular white sugar.  You can substitute with light brown sugar or golden caster sugar for a similar flavour if you can’t get hold of coconut sugar.  It’s what gives the cooked cake that rich, dark colour.  Honestly I can’t stop sniffing the stuff.  It’s like toffee apples and fairgrounds.

The extra drizzle of icing is just a bit of pretty for pretty’s sake 😉

Looking for more vegan cake recipes?

These are our tried and THOROUGHLY tested favourites …

Lemon and Poppy Seed Cake – I made this recently for prospective buyers of our house, one lady took 3 slices!

Easy Chocolate Cake – so easy that sticky little fingers can get involved.

Vegan Vanilla Cake – made with Foodie Flavours Gorilla Vanilla so yeah, eating cake helps save gorillas!

Chocolate Fudge Cake – because you can never have enough chocolate cake recipes!

I’d also love to hear from you if you make this Pear and Almond Cake! Just leave a comment as it’s so helpful and I love to hear how the recipe worked out for you! Thank you so much!

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