Spiced Sticky Pear Puddings with a Brandy Toffee Sauce

These spiced sticky pear puddings with a brandy toffee sauce are what my dessert dreams are made of. These are essentially a sticky toffee pudding with added spices, pear and a very generous few glugs of warming brandy into the sauce.

I love them in these individual pudding cups. They stay so moist and fluffy and it means the whole top of the sponge is soft with only a crust on the bottom. There's both chopped pear in the batter as well as that little disc of pear sitting on top, which I think just gives a bit of elegance to an otherwise really simple dessert. 

My fiancé said that I had to share the recipe because life would be sad if this wasn't shared.

Ingredients - makes 8 individual puddings
Pear Puddings:
200g soft pitted dates, chopped
250ml boiling water
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
125g unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
zest of 1 orange
100g soft light brown sugar
50g soft dark brown sugar
2 eggs
180g self-raising flour
3 tsp ground ginger
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
2 x pears

Brandy Toffee Sauce:
300ml double cream
50g unsalted butter
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla
45ml brandy
100g soft light brown sugar
50g soft dark brown sugar
extra thick cream, to serve

Method
Start by greasing your individual pudding cups with butter, dust them with flour and line the bottom with a small circle of parchment paper. If you have a spray grease, you can use this instead. Pre-heat your oven to 180°C.

Place the chopped dates into a bowl and pour over the boiling water. Add in the bicarbonate of soda and stir together. Cover and leave to stand for 15 minutes.

In a mixing bowl, cream together the butter, vanilla, orange zest and sugars until pale and fluffy. Mix in the eggs, one at a time. Add the softened dates, along with the leftover liquid, and whisk together. Add in the self-raising flour, spices and salt. Stir until almost combined. Set aside. Peel one of the pears and cut into a small dice. Add this to the mixture and finish mixing until completely combined. Set aside while you prepare the pear slices.

Take your second pear and thinly slice it from the bottom so it cuts through the core with every slice. Remove any pips. Using a cutter that fits the base of your pudding cups perfectly, cut out 8 discs of pear. Place them into the pudding cups on top of the baking parchment. Divide the sponge batter between the pudding cups. Bake for 20-25 minutes until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.

While the puddings are baking, you can make the sauce. Place all of the ingredients into a saucepan over medium-low heat. Once simmering, cook for approx. 5 minutes until thickened. Set aside until needed.

To serve, let the puddings sit for 5 minutes before tipping them out of their tins. Re-warm the sauce if needed. Serve the puddings with lots of sauce and a good dollop of extra thick cream.

These can be made in advance and popped in the microwave to be re-heated. I recommend re-heating the puddings and sauce seperately.