Spiced Fruit Bake with Vanilla Bean Custard (Vegan & Gluten Free)

December 13, 2022

This is a simple, festive dish everyone can enjoy. Best served warm, it's delicious with just a dollop of custard or your fave ice-cream,  and also makes a great left-over treat that goes with almost every sweet. Best of all you can make a day ahead and store in the fridge until you are ready to bake and serve.

NOTE: You can sub frozen blackberries for fresh, or fresh/frozen cherries instead of blackberries.

Ingredients

The Fruit Mix

2 large apples, cored and sliced into wedges

2 large pears, cored and sliced into wedges

430g can pineapple chunks in juice (keep juice for baking)

1/4 cup dried cranberries

250g fresh blackberries (set aside 50g to garnish)

1/2 cup roughly chopped pecans

Spiced Juice Marinade

125g melted plant based Nuttelex (plus extra for greasing base of baking dish)

1 tbsp lemon juice

1/4 cup coconut or brown sugar

1 tbsp maple syrup (or agave syrup)

1 tsp heaped teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

Tools

baking dish medium

whisk

2 medium saucepans

large mixing bowl (for fruit)

small mixing bowl

Vegan Vanilla Bean Custard (serves 6)

600ml almond milk

1/4 cup corn flour

1/4 cup castor sugar

1 tsp vanilla bean paste

1/4 tsp tumeric powder

Directions

The Baked Fruit

1Preheat oven to 160C fan or 180C. Lightly grease the baking dish with Nuttelex

2To Make the Spiced Juice Marinade: In a large bowl combine the melted Nuttelex, sugar, maple syrup, cinnamon and nutmeg, then add 2 generous tablespoons of the canned pineapple juice, plus 1 tablespoon lemon juice and use a whisk to mix and combine.

3Add the apple & pear wedges, dried cranberries, roughly chopped pecans, pineapples pieces and 200 grams blackberries (reserving 50g for topping just before serving).

4Gently mix all the fruit and marinade together then pour fruit into the lightly greased baking dish & bake for one hour.

5Just before serving, sprinkle the top with the remaining blackberries.

Vegan Vanilla Bean Custard

1Place 500ml of the almond milk on low heat in saucepan.

2In a small bowl add cornflour, castor sugar, turmeric powder, vanilla bean paste & the remaining 100 ml of the almond milk and whisk until you have a smooth paste.

3Then gently stir the paste into the warm milk & continuously whisk on medium heat until it starts to bubble & thicken like a custard. (It takes a couple of minutes). Then decant into serving bowl/jug to serve.

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