It is cinnamon season. Or at least the time of year when we turn to the warm, sweet "bun spices" such as this. If you use it thoughtfully you can avoid the sledgehammer effect present in the high-street coffee-shop cinnamon buns and Danish pastries.
Cinnamon offers sweet notes of comfort to our baking. It is warm, but not in a peppery sense, and to my taste is the sweetest of all the spices, and more so than clove or nutmeg, the other most popular baking flavourings.
Used with a little too much generosity, cinnamon can cloy. I use it sparingly in pear and apple puddings, for seasoning dried fruit and adding a little intrigue to chocolate. (The best cinnamon-scented chocolate I have found is the admirably restrained, golden-flecked ganache squares from Artisan du Chocolat.)
We had the first true snap of cold this week, so I dusted off the baking tins, making both a hazelnut cake and some biscuits for Christmas (more of which nearer the time). The cake started out as a celebration of the new season's ripening nuts and my bumper crop of Comice pears but ended up as a hymn to cinnamon, which found its way, albeit subtly, into cake, fruit and its pebble-textured topping. Even then, restraint is the key. The overkill effect is lessened by using several pinches rather than a teaspoon. You can get an awful lot of ground spice in a teaspoon.
I have seen thin sheets of cinnamon bark being rolled into exquisite parchment-thin curls on the floor of a hut in Sri Lanka, in aroom whose every stone seemed steeped in the spice. I slide whole rolled quills into pans of poached pears and apricots. Yet this is one of the few spices I buy ready ground. Its character doesn't disappear when pre-ground in the way cardamom or coriander often does. Providing you keep it in a screwtop jar, this is one spice we don't need apestle and mortar for.
It added heart to the gently flavoured pear layer of my cake – even more so when I simmered it with the peeled and chopped fruit and a little sugar before putting it ontop of the base cake mixture. But it was an even happier partner for the hazelnuts I added to moisten the cake and which meant it could be kept in good condition for several days. The bun spices all work with nuts, but the sweeter nuts especially – which is why it features so often on those brass plates of ridiculously sticky pastries involving layers of filo pastry and almonds. It is a spice to usher our cooking gently towards Christmas.
PEAR AND HAZELNUT CAKE
Serve 8-12
For the pears:
large, juicy lemon 1
pears 750g
caster sugar 3 tbsp
ground cinnamon a pinch or 2
butter, softened 175g
golden caster sugar 85g
light muscovado sugar 85g
skinned hazelnuts 80g
eggs 2
self-raising flour 165g
cinnamon ½ tsp
vanilla extract a few drops
For the crumble:
plain flour 100g
butter 75g
demerara sugar 2 tbsp
a little cinnamon and extra demerara sugar
Preheat the oven to 170C/gas mark 3. Line the base of a 21-22cm square tin with baking parchment.
Squeeze the lemon into a mixing bowl. Peel the pears, core them and cut them into small chunks, dropping them into the juice. Put them and the juice into a saucepan, bring to the boil and turn down to a gentle simmer. Scatter over the sugar and cinnamon. Let the pears cook, with the occasional stir, until translucent, tender and soft. Set aside.
Beat the butter and sugars in a mixer until light (5-10 minutes). Toast the nuts in a shallow pan till golden brown then grind quite finely. Beat the eggs gently and add to the mix with the beater on slow. Fold in the nuts, flour, cinnamon and vanilla. When all is smooth, scoop into the tin and smooth flat.
Lift the pears from their syrup with adraining spoon, reserving the juice. Put the pears on top of the cake mixture.
Blitz the flour and butter to crumbs in afood processor. Add the demerara and mix. Remove the bowl from the stand. Add a few drops of water. Run a fork through so some of the crumbs stick together. Scatter this loosely over the top, followed by apinch of cinnamon and a little demerara.
Bake for about an hour, checking for doneness with a skewer. Remove from the oven. Bring the juice from the pears to the boil for a few minutes till there are 3 or 4 tbsp left. Trickle over the cake. Let cool.
CINNAMON DOUGHNUTS
Makes 8
Plain flour 250g
Ground cinnamon ½ tsp
A hefty pinch of salt
Butter, cut into cubes 20g
Sachet of dried yeast 1 x 7g
Milk 150g
Caster sugar 1 tbsp
Egg yolk 1
To fry:
a deep pan of vegetable or groundnut oil
To serve:
caster sugar and ground cinnamon
warmed jam or melted chocolate
Put the flour, cinnamon, salt and butter in a large mixing bowl. Rub the butter in with your fingertips until the mixture resembles crumbs. Sprinkle in the yeast.
Gently warm the milk and sugar in asaucepan, then mix in the yolk. Stir this into the flour. Roll into a ball then knead on a floured board for 5 minutes until springy. Put it back in the bowl, cover with a tea towel and leave it in a warm place for an hour or so.
Break the dough into 8 pieces. Roll each into a ball then push the handle of a wooden spoon (or your finger) through the centre. Leave the doughnuts on a lightly floured tray for 20 minutes to rise a little more.
Get the oil hot. Lower the doughnuts carefully into the oil and let them fry for 3 or 4 minutes until the underside colours. Turn them over to cook the other side.
Scatter a thick layer of caster sugar on a baking sheet. Sprinkle over a few pinches of cinnamon and mix. As you take each one from the oil roll until coated. Eat warm.
Email Nigel at nigel.slater@observer.co.uk or visit theguardian.com/profile/nigelslater for all his recipes in one place
