PEAR AND CARDAMOM CAKE (it's vegan, gluten-free & refined sugar-free)

On a not uncommonly wintery Swedish “summer’s” day, I thought I’d give some vegan baking a go. I have never baked with buckwheat flour or raw agave syrup before, but thought that whilst I am “veganising” my meals, I might as well “healthify” them too. As these ingredients (in the quantities I needed) are fairly inexpensive and the investment in time so little, I didn’t think experimenting with this cake would be such a huge risk. My small gamble paid off deliciously and I am very happy to add this ever-so-simple little number to my baking repertoire.
PEAR AND CARDAMOM CAKE
Prep time: 3 min – Cook time: 30 min – Servings: 6
INGREDIENTS:
1 dl raw agave syrup
2 dl buckwheat flour
3 dl canned pear halves in juice (approx. 6 pear halves plus 1 dl pear juice)
1/2 dl slivered almonds
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cardamom
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees. Grease a ceramic baking dish with soy/vegetable oil based spread.
2. Combine agave syrup, flour, pears (plus juice), baking powder, almonds and spices in a large mixing bowl, smooshing the pears up roughly with a fork.
3. Pour batter into greased baking dish (mine is a 22 by 28 cm rectangular form, on the shallow side).
4. Pop in oven and bake for around 30 minutes (until the top is lightly golden, the edges have browned and come away from sides of the dish and a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean). The cake will not have risen very much.
5. Serve slices of cake warm with a generous amount of soy vanilla custard. Soy vanilla ice cream would also work well, no doubt.

This super simple recipe is based on my 1, 2, 3 pineapple coconut cake.