October 14, 2003
Gâteau de Mamy à la Poire
On Sunday, Marie-Laure came over "pour le goûter". Le goûter is the afternoon snack kids are given when they come out of school around 4. In my family (by that I mean "at my parents'"), it is also called simply le thé, and is practically an institution. Around 5 on weekends, somebody will invariably ask "on fait le thé?" (alternatively "on prend le goûter?"). Cookies or cake (often home-baked by my mother) will be served, washed down by liters of tea. It is a habit I am very fond of, and one that I am always happy to indulge in when I can.
And so, I baked a cake.
I used a family standby called "Gâteau de Mamy". As the name implies, this is my grandmother's recipe, which she calls "Gâteau d'Ella" because it was her dear friend Ella's recipe originally. It is anybody's guess what Ella used to call it. This is actually what I think is called an upside down cake, meaning that you lay fresh fruit at the bottom of the cake pan, and then pour the dough on top. Sort of a cake equivalent to the tarte tatin. The basic recipe is this.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Melt 125g of butter, set aside to cool. The original recipe calls for unsalted ("beurre doux") but here I used half unsalted, half salted ("beurre salé") and I liked it. Butter a non-stick 8-inch cake pan. Wash, peel and cut up 3 large or 4 small apples. Lay the pieces of fruit at the bottom of the pan. This recipe works with a variety of fruit : apples, apricots, plums... Here, I used 6 small pears (of three different kinds).
Mix 150g of sugar with two eggs. Add 70g of flour and half a packet of baking powder (5g). (This time I experimented a little and substituted 20g of powdered almonds for 20g of flour, which worked really well.) Add the butter. Pour the dough on the fruit in the pan, and bake for 40 to 50 minutes. Let the cake settle for a few minutes. Invert it on a plate (the fruit side will be on top), scrape the bits of fruit that may stick at the bottom of the pan and place those bits evenly on the inverted cake. Use a second plate to invert the cake again (the fruit side will then be at the bottom).
The resulting cake is golden, incredibly moist, light and fruity, with a slightly crusty edge, and it is very hard to stop at just one slice. But if you do and there are leftovers, your reward will be that this cake is even better the next day...
 Butterless Apple Crumble |
 Vanilla Oat Milk Tapioca Pudding |
 Quince Almond Cake |
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I just wanted to be one of the first to tell you how wonderful your site is!
The design, the photography, the writing, the FOOD, all wonderful!
So happy you're finally here.
Congratulations!
Hey Deb!
Thank you so much! I'm very happy you like it, and I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I love yours!
Hi Clotilde!
I love your site! I have a question about this recipe, and please excuse my ignorance... here in the states, butter is sold mostly by the pound, each pound being divided up into 4 sticks. Do you have an estimate as to how much butter this would translate to in your recipe? Also, baking powder is sold in canisters and measured using teaspoons... any ideas how to convert?
I am a total novice when it comes to using European measurements! Do you know of any websites that can help me make this transition? I really want to try this cake!
Take care, and see you over at the CL BB!
Rebecca
Hello Rebecca! It's nice to see you here!
Yes, the measuring differences between here and the us is a headache. I've had the problem both ways : trying to make French recipes in the US, and trying to make US recipes here! But now I have sets of measuring cups and spoons as well as a kitchen scale in grams, so I'm pretty much ready for anything! I intend to put up a measure equivalents section very soon...
To answer your questions, 1 stick of butter as packaged in the US is 112g of butter. So in this recipe, 1 stick plus a tenth of another would be good. As for baking powder, one packet is equivalent of a teaspoon. So here, half a tsp should do the trick!
If you try this recipe let me know how it goes!
Hi Clotilde, I'm going to be original: Your web site is great, the pictures are beautiful, I love the recipes, your English is amazing. Really!
Now that's out of the way, let me tell you I had great success with the gateau last weekend. I made it for several friends as part of a brunch menu and I did alter the recipe a bit (which I normally don't do, as I am philosophically opposed to unnecessary "improvements" for their own sake), but this time I did fiddle with it and added:
- finely diced Turkish dried apricots and
- minced candied ginger,
both stirred into the batter. This made the slices look like mosaic, and the additional flavors were a nice counterpart to the apple (couldn't find good pears) but not overpowering (I didn't use much). (I did this b/c one of my friends generally doesn't like food that has no spices in it. And she really liked this slightly gingery version. I know the recipe is probably great as is, and I'm planning on making the un-tarted-up version soon.)
Also, I served the cake inverted (the bottom was quite a bit moist and I didn't want it sticking to the plate) and as it was looking a bit messy (some pieces of fruit did stick to the pan), I covered up the imperfections with a sprinkling of lightly toasted sliced almond, and sifted some confectioners' sugar on top.
It was great, and looked both rustic and elegant, which has always kind of been my ideal aesthetically.
L'oeuf au cocotte (?) is now my almost daily breakfast. The variations are endless. It's tasty and filling, doesn't make a mess of my (teeny New York) kitchen, and is pretty to boot. (*My* ramekins are those FLAME colored ones from LeCreuset. Beyootiful.)
Which is a long way of saying Merci beaucoup!!!!
Katerina - Thank you so much for the wonderful compliments! I am thrilled you liked the cake, and the addition of dried apricots and ginger sounds really lovely, both taste and texture-wise. Congrats on the successful tinkering!
And the oeuf cocotte is your daily breakfast? Wow, that sure pleases me too! Thanks for telling me all this, and you are quite welcome!
clotilde - i have just slipped cake #2 from your site into the oven, and although i did a MAJOR boo-boo (cake batter looked kind of sparse, blanketing the pears, then i realized with horror thati had forgotten to mix in the melted butter!! - so pears will be mixed in throughout the batter instead of tatin'ed on top - or bottom), i am certain that it is going to be delicious!!
your rice entry for the IMBB looks great - i am dying to make my way through all of the great ideas there! good job, girl!
kaf
Kelli Ann - I'm happy you tried this recipe, it's one of my absolute favorites! I'm sure the batter thing wasn't a problem : did it turn out as well as you hoped?
Hi Clotilde, I've been reading your site for some time and I just have to say, there isn't one recipe in here that didn't turn out as wonderful as expected when I tried it. :) (although there was that melt-in-your-mouth chocolate cake, 'Cake of Doom' to my friends, that once came out like a self saucing pudding... not at all unpleasant!)
Anyway, just wanted to say, for the measurement conversions... I know you have a conversion page linked, but one thing you may like to add somewhere is Google's calculator toy. Just type in what you want to convert in the search box, hit enter, and there it goes. eg. "150g in ounces". Works for most standard units of measurement.
Unfortunately it doesn't know what a stick or a packet is... But this does:
http://www.onlineconversion.com/cooking.htm
Hope that helps some people out there. :)
Oh, forgot to mention. I made this cake (the pear version) at the weekend served with cardamom cream (1/2 cup whipped cream, 2 tbs dark brown sugar, 1/2 tsp ground cardamom, whip to desired consistency) and it was well received! Another success ;)
Incidentally, the cream is rather tasty by itself...
I made this last night with apples for dinner. I admit I had to restrain myself from adding frosting, since in America we ALWAYS have frosting on a cake. But I stuck with the directions and it was absolutley wonderful - and so simple. Thank you! Nyama
Hi Clotilde!
i love your site, the pics and all the stories that accompany them, they are so refreshing and make them personal.
I made this cake and i must have done something wrong. the cake turned out really mushy. i converted the grams to ounces but there were some odd numbers like 5.42 oz and i kind of guessed at the measurements. could you convert all the measurements to ounces for me? what do think i did wrong? i would love to make the cake and have it turn out just like yours. i love pears and cake!
thanks!
ally
Hi Clotilde.
I baked this cake yesterday and i really loved it. I decided to use cristalized ginger cut into small pieces (spread over the pears) and it worked well.
I love your site!
Thank you for all the wonderfull recipes
Hello Clotilde, aujourd'hui, 14 octobre, où plein de mes enfants viennent déjeuner, j'ai voulu faire "le gateau de mamie" (ce que je suis d'ailleurs) et j'ai regardé ta recette que tu avais mis en ligne le...14 octobre 2003! Quelle coïncidence! (and, by the way, it's JeanFrançois's birthday)
J'espère que tu vas bien . love
Brigitte
My husband's cousin is a fan of yours and has used several of your recipes. However, last night she made this cake and all I can say is OMG! I was talking about it all day to the girls at work and my husband. I can't wait to make it for my family and see their reactions, I hope they will be pleasantly surprised! Thank you!
-Miss Piggy
I made two of these cakes for a dinner party. Divine. So moist and just altogether yummy. I made them a day in advance and wrapped them in foil for transport (party was at someone elses house as I have no dining table...it's a students life) Served with custard mmmmm
I made this cake using three different kinds of pears (and rather more pears than you suggest) and it was absolutely wonderful. Most of the pears I bought were quite hard, but they softened--not too much--in the cooking, and were just perfect. I'm not accustomed to metric measurements, but it really wasn't difficult to translate them. Thanks for the recipe.
I baked this 2 weeks ago and it was a great success. I used red apples, plums and the last of some frozen blueberries that I had left over from a previous baking session. I also tried making my own clotted cream for serving and it worked, to a point. Anyway the cake was enjoyed by all.
Hello Clotilde,
I am a regular reader of your blog. I find all your recipes delicious and fuss-free...with the added bonus of your wit to spice up the blogs. :-)
i tried your pear cake with some small substitutions: i used only half the sugar mentioned (unrefined cane sugar), used clarified butter instead of butter, and used a 6-inch springform cake pan lined with baking paper. i added a dash of vanilla to the batter and forgot to add the baking soda. :-(
the cake turned out superb! it didnt stick to the bottom. being almost 70% fruit, i dont feel guilty about eating it. i'm on a low glycemic load diet you see.
thanks so much!
I have both of your books so I made this recipe with apples out of the Chocolate and Zucchini book with apples picked from my mother's trees. I felt transported to France! It was so delicious! I can't wait to try it with pears! Thank you!
I was just given some freestone peaches so I tried this with those & it's wonderful!
The fruit wasn't yet soft & still had a bit of sourness, so I macerated the slices in a couple of tablespoons brown sugar for a few hours, which drew out just a little juice & made a nice syrup, but not too gooey or sweet.
I didn't re-invert after turning it out, just left it with the fruit on top -- very beautiful.
Big hit, & I plan to try it with different fruits. Thanks so much for this easy, excellent recipe.
I'm delighted to hear it, thanks for reporting back!
Hi Clotilde,
I made this with apples on Sunday and my family loved it. I didn't think it was too sweet, but do you have any idea how far one could cut the butter? I love moist cakes, but this one left grease on the plate and a heavy feeling in my tummy. I think I'll cut 30 grams next time and see how it goes.
I love your site. As you can see, I'm working through the archives!
Hi all, just made this for an all American Thanksgiving (with a French twist) and it was a smash hit! Wanted to note though that I do think this recipe could be quite good with less sugar and butter. And for an 8-inch cake pan, maybe mine was particularly tall, but I actually doubled the batter recipe for four small apples at the bottom. And instead of chunking the apples, I sliced them and put them in a circular pattern which was quite pretty when presented upside-down. For measurement conversions, here's what I used: 150g of white granulated sugar is 3/4 cup, 65g of all-purpose white flour is 1/2 cup, so 70g= a little more than half a cup, one stick of butter, one tsp of baking powder. But as I said, I think it would be just as good with less butter and sugar. And dried fruit as another reader suggested worked out well (dried plums in my case).
Thanks for sharing your variation, Lily, I'm glad it rose up to the occasion!