I made this cake for a family get-together at Easter to serve with my Vegan Blueberry Cheesecake that my cousin had made. Even more delicious when someone else makes it! When we served the pudding selection to our family, we didn’t tell them they were healthier versions of the desserts, but they went down a treat! Just to clarify, this cake is free of refined sugar, using fruit and natural sweetener (xylitol) instead!

Sugar Free Chocolate and Pear Cake  

125g dark chocolate (make sure it’s sugar free although normal works fine too!)

50g coconut oil

150g unsweetened apple sauce 

125g xylitol

1tsp vanilla extract

150g plain flour

25g cocoa

1tsp baking powder

3 pears (I used Williams pears, peeled and roughly chopped)

125ml milk (feel free to use a non-dairy alternative) 

Preheat oven to 180 degrees.

Start by melting the dark chocolate and coconut oil together in a heatproof bowl, either in a microwave or over a saucepan of lightly bubbling water (make sure the bowl doesn’t touch the water).  Set aside to cool slightly.

Stir through the apple sauce, xylitol, and vanilla essence.

In a separate bowl, sieve together the flour, cocoa, baking powder. Pour the chocolate mix into the dry mix, along with the pears and milk,;fold together.

Transfer to a greased and lined 8inch springform tin. Bake for 35-40mins until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Leave to cool for at least 4 hours, or overnight.

I dusted the cake with icing sugar which obviously actually defeated the point that it was sugar free! You could also serve it with some vanilla ice-cream- which would be delicious and also very much NOT sugar free!

The texture of the cake is quite fudgy and gooey, so it does need the chilling/cooling time to set up, although I bet it would be delicious eaten warm with a spoon!

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