Pear & Dark Chocolate Cake

After not having baked for weeks due to a disastrous attempt that resulted in severe bakers block, I thought it was about time that I got back into the kitchen and regained my mojo once again! I woke up this Sunday morning inspired and motivated to bake... and so I started with something simple and familiar by making banana bread... and when that came out without incident, I gained back a little bit of my confidence and decided to be a little more adventurous. My mind mentally checked through what I had in my kitchen and I recalled these gorgeous pears that my mother had given me earlier in the week... as well as the two blocks of dark chocolate that I had purchased just yesterday.

Pear and dark chocolate - two things that I enjoy thoroughly... together, how could they go wrong?

And so that started my google search into what kind of pear and dark chocolate combos were out there in the world. I didn't want to make a tart, which seemed to be the most popular choice, and instead I recalled my Magnolia Bakery fruit torte that I made previously - I wanted something like that... a tea cake with pear and dark chocolate embedded within it. And with that in mind, I went into the kitchen and came up with this!

Ingredients

1 cup plain flour
1 tablespoon (yes, a tablespoon!) of baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon sugar
3 large eggs, at room temperature
125g unsalted butter, cubed
3/4 cup caster sugar
2 pears, peeled and diced
Half a family sized block of dark chocolate, roughly chopped into chunks the same size as the pear

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease and line a 20cm round cake tin (springform or not, it doesn't really matter).
2. In a bowl, sift the flour, baking powder, cinnamon sugar and salt together.
3. In a saucepan over medium heat, melt and brown the butter. It will bubble and foam and brown at the bottom, so be sure to scrape it. It'll take about 5-7 minutes, depending on the heat, but you're looking for the butter to turn a light golden brown. Don't worry about the brown bits in the butter. Turn off the heat and keep it aside.
4. Whilst the butter is browning, turn the mixer on and beat the eggs on high speed until they've thickened and doubled or tripled in volume - this will take about 5 minutes.
6. Add the sugar to the eggs and continue to beat for another 2-3 minutes.
7. Add half the butter (brown bits and all) and half the flour. When it is just incorporated, add the rest of the butter and the flour and only let it beat for another minute at most.
8. Turn off the mixer and if the flour hasn't completely incorporated, gently fold it through with a silicon spatula. You don't want to overbeat and kill all of that lovely air that you got into the eggs at the start!
9. Pour the batter into the cake tin and tap once sharply on the benchtop to get rid of any air pockets. Then, sprinkle the pear over the top of the cake, followed by the chocolate.
10. Put it in the oven (middle shelf) and bake for 45 minutes.
11. When the cake is done (I needed another 5 minutes as the middle was a bit soft still), remove from the oven, let it sit in the cake tin to cool and then move onto a plate.

Pre-bake...

Post bake!

The smell of this cake baking is just incredible. And the sight of it, fresh out of the oven, with the chocolate all molten and shiny - it took all of my will power to not just dig into it straight away! I waited for the cake to cool a bit first, but ate my first slice when it was still warm, and the chocolate still melted... and it was delicious. So delicious I polished it off in seconds and then went back for another slice!

Oozy melty chocolate... how can anyone resist?

This was such an easy cake to make, and the pear and dark chocolate went together perfectly. It was gorgeous on its own warm, but I imagine that it could only be better with fresh cream or maybe even ice cream.

I am overjoyed to find that my bakers block is gone! May this signify a new period of harmony between myself and my oven...

thesuzchef x