My first bake of 2016!

I have some pears in the fridge that need to be consumed and I also cravings for a nutty cake. Did a bit of Googling and found the easiest recipe there is from the trusted BBC Good Food site.

Some of you may know, I am a keen cook but I get impatient with waiting for food to cook or weighing up different ingredients 😑 So I only go for simple yet tasty recipes.

This hazelnut, chocolate and pear cake has 3 of my favourite ingredients. The ground nuts in the cake mixture give the cake a whole new dimension of deliciousness with its crunchy texture and sweet nuttiness. The fruitiness of the pear lightens the cake and gives it added moisture. The dark chocolate, well, it’s chocolate. Can’t go wrong with that!

Here is the slightly adapted recipe:

Ingredients

175g butter
2 large eggs, beaten
4 ripe Conference pears
100g blanched hazelnuts
140g self-raising flour
140g caster sugar
50g dark chocolate, chopped into small chunks
Additional dark or milk chocolate, melted for drizzling (optional)

Method

Preheat the oven (fan 140C/ conventional 160C/gas mark 3).
Butter and line the base of a 20cm round cake tin.
Grind the hazelnuts in a food processor until fairly fine (leave some coarse crumbs if you like a bit more texture).
Add the flour and mix briefly. If like me, you only have a mini food chopper, simply empty the ground nuts into the large bowl with the flour).
Add the butter (soften and cut into pieces) and pulse / mix until it forms crumbs.
Add the sugar and the beaten eggs, mix briefly.
Peel, core and chop two of the pears into small chunks.
Stir one half of the pears chunks and the chopped chocolate lightly into the cake mixture.
Spoon the mixture into the cake tin and smooth the top.
Add the remaining pears and scatter over the top of the cake. Press down lightly.
Bake for 50 minutes, until firm to the touch and no cake mixture sticks to the skewer when you put the skewers into the centre of the cake.
Cool the lovely cake in the tin for 10 minutes and then turn out and cool on a wire rack.
Optional: For the topping, simply melt additional chocolate and drizzle it on the top of the cake. You can be as creative as you like. You may also brush warm jam on top instead.