Pear almond cake

This cake is inspired by a recipe in Ottolenghi and Goh's book "Sweet" - an apricot almond cake that I decided to change up to a pear version.

Although I usually think of pears as a fall/winter fruit, their flavor and usefulness in desserts still speaks to me now, with hints of spring in the air. This pear almond cake is dense, moist and oh so delicious! Truth be told, I baked this one in late January and am just getting around to writing about it now. Oh, how time flies.

Bartlett, Bosc or D'Anjou are my usual pear choices, although I must say I usually end up veering toward the Bosc end of the pear spectrum. I simply enjoy their flavor and texture.

I generally prefer to poach my own pears, especially since those that one buys in the grocery store are generally rock hard and need days to ripen appropriately. Poaching helps to coax out that ripened texture and allows them to be used sooner than you would if waiting for them to ripen naturally.

I create a poaching liquid using 2 parts water to 1 or 1.5 parts sugar, giving me a light-ish syrup. I like to add in some lemon zest, a grate or two of nutmeg and perhaps a pinch of ginger and a few pieces of star anise. Nice and lightly spiced. I peel, core and halve my pears. 

The key with poaching is low and slow. The most helpful thing for me is the cartouche -  essentially a round of parchment paper with a small hole created in the center to allow steam to escape, placed cozily over the pears to keep them submerged. It prevents sides or ends of pears from sticking out of the poaching liquid and developing an unsightly brown tinge. We simply can't have that, now can we?

I let them go until I see a change from a dense whitish color to a more translucent, buttery color. I then stick a fork in to see if the tines go in easily. We're done!

See the translucence!

The cake is made with your basic ingredients - butter, sugar, egg, flour, a bit of salt, lemon zest, vanilla and almond extracts and some sour cream. A sprinkle of almond flour and the pears are nestled on top of the batter and then covered with an intriguing topping concoction made with butter, sugar, spices, salt and egg. Hmmm - this should be interesting.

Batter in!

Almond Flour sprinkled!

Pears and topping on! ready to go into the oven

Here it is just out of the oven. Looks good!

Let's do the recipe! I outline the steps/ingredients below but you can click here for a PDF of the recipe.

1. Butter a 9" springform pan and line the bottom with parchment. Heat the oven to 375ºF.
2. Drain and blot dry your poached pears, then slice each half into quarters. You'll need a couple of pears total (more or less, depending on how you like to arrange your slices).
2. Make the topping: in a medium microwave safe bowl, melt 56 g (4 tablespoons) unsalted butter; stir in 100 g/1/2 cup granulated sugar, 1/2 teaspoon ground coriander, a pinch of ground ginger, a large pinch of salt; cool for a few minutes then stir in two large lightly beaten eggs and set aside.
3. For the cake, put 84 g/6 tablespoons unsalted, room temperature butter with 200 g/1 cup granulated sugar in your mixer bowl with the paddle attachment and beat on medium-high for a couple of minutes; add 2 large eggs, one at a time, blending each one in and scraping down the sides of the bowl a couple of times; blend in the zest of one lemon, a teaspoon of vanilla extract and 1/4 teaspoon almond extract.
4. In a separate bowl sift 220 g/1 3/4 cups all purpose flour with 10 g baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon salt; have 2/3 cup sour cream standing by as well.
5. With the mixer on low add the flour mixture to the butter/sugar/egg mixture alternating with the sour cream, beginning and ending with the flour.
6. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan, smooth the top with an offset spatula. Sprinkle 35 g/1/3 cup almond flour over the batter, then arrange your pear slices in a design of your liking.
7. Now spoon/pour the topping mixture over the whole shebang!
8. Bake this baby for about an hour until a tester into the middle comes out clean. Always watch what's going on in there folks!. Cool in the pan for about 20 minutes before unmolding. 
9. Serve warm or at room temperature.

I chose to top it with some lightly sweetened whipped cream (although my cream seemed to have lost some of it's whip!).

This was absolutely delicious! And Steve liked it too. Yay!!!