Chocolate pear cake with chocolate sauce

The best chocolate has a high cocoa content and uses only pure cocoa butter (rather than vegetable or palm oil). Look for cocoa powder that has been “dutched’’. This process darkens the powder and gives a smoother flavour. Check the label when buying — the higher the fat content, the better the flavour.

Cake

3 large	Pears, beurre bosc (Main)
1	Lemon, juice of
1 ¼ cups	Flour
¼ cup	Cocoa powder, dark
1 ½ tsp	Baking powder
¾ cup	Caster sugar, plus 2 Tbsp for sprinkling
½ cup	Ground almonds
3	Eggs
1 tsp	Vanilla extract
150 g	Butter, melted and cooled
½ cup	Milk

Chocolate sauce

125 g	Dark chocolate, cut into small pieces or coarsely grated
½ cup	Cream, double cream is good here
¼ cup	Milk, full-fat
1 tsp	Liquid honey

Directions

Cake

1. Heat the oven to 180C. Grease and line a 23cm round cake tin.
2. Slice the pears thinly placing in a bowl as you go and sprinkle with the lemon juice to prevent browning.
3. Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder into a large bowl. Add ¾ cup caster sugar, the ground almonds, eggs and vanilla extract. Using an electric hand beater, beat on a low speed until smooth.
4. Gently stir in the butter and milk.
5. Spread half the cake mixture over the base of the prepared tin and arrange half of the pear slices on top. Spread over the remaining cake mixture then arrange the remaining pears on top. Sprinkle with 2 Tbsp caster sugar.
6. Bake for 45 minutes or until a skewer is inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.
7. Leave to sit in the tin for 10 minutes before removing. Serve warm with chocolate sauce, cream or yoghurt.

Chocolate sauce

1. Combine ingredients in a small heatproof bowl and place over a saucepan of gently simmering water. Stir until smooth.
2. Remove bowl from heat and leave to cool a little. This sauce thickens as it cools. Makes about 1 cup.