Dark chocolate & pear cake
A bit of a showstopper, this is a cake for impressing people, but apart from a bit of pear peeling, it is as easy to pull off as any other cake. Try to cut the slices through the sides of the pears to maximise the dramatic colour contrast and appreciative gasps.
200g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids) 5 pears (round and squat ones such as Williams Bon Chrétien) Juice of 1/2 lemon 150g salted butter, softened 150g soft brown sugar 3 eggs 75g rye flour (or mix of rye and spelt) 75g white self-raising flour 2 tsp baking powder you will need A loose-bottomed 20cm cake tin
1 Preheat oven to 190C/Fan 170C/ Gas 5. Set a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and break 100g of
the chocolate into it, and leave it to melt. Remove from the heat once it has melted but leave the bowl over the pan. 2 Peel the skin from the pears, coating each finished one with lemon juice as you go, to prevent browning. Keep the stalks in place and slice a small section away from the bottom of each pear so that it sits flat on the
bottom of the cake tin. Butter a cake tin and line it with baking parchment and place the pears into it.
3 Cream together the butter and sugar, then beat in the eggs, one at a time, making sure each is well combined before adding the next.
4 Add the flour, baking powder, a pinch of salt and the melted chocolate, and stir well until everything is combined. Spoon the mixture in around the pears and smooth the top out as well as you can. Break up the remaining 100g chocolate and push it into the batter.
5 Baking time does depend on the juiciness of the fruit, so be prepared to test and return to the oven if it is not ready. As a guide, bake for between 40–50 mins or until a skewer pushed into the centre of the cake comes out clean.