This recipe is take from Yvette Van Boven’s book, Homemade Winter.
Ingredients
- For the pears:
- 3 medium-sized crisp, firm pears (such as Bosc), peeled but whole, with the stem left on
- 1 (750-ml) bottle dry white wine
- 1¼ cups (250 g) sugar
- 4 cloves
- 3 star anise
- 8 cardamom pods
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- For the cake
- :
- 1½ cups plus 2 tbsp (200 g) butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
- 1 cup (200 g) sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1½ cups (200 g) self-rising flour
- 1 generous tbsp ground cardamom
- Pinch of salt
- 3 oz (90 g) white chocolate, in chunks
- You will need:
- 9x5inch (1.5l) loaf pan
Method
Poach the pears: In a large saucepan, combine the pears, wine, sugar, cloves, star anise, cardamom, and cinnamon and poach for 30 minutes over low heat
Take the pears out of the liquid and set aside to cool. Add 2 ½ cups (500 ml) water to the poaching liquid and boil to reduce the liquid by half. Let cool
Make the cake: Preheat the oven to 350°F (170°C)
Using a hand mixer, beat the butter and sugar in a large bowl until creamy. Beat in the eggs one at the time. Don’t add a new egg until the previous one is incorporated
Sift the flour, cardamom, and salt over the batter and fold it in
Grease a 9-by-5-inch (1.5 l) loaf pan and line it with parchment paper. Grease the parchment paper
Spoon the batter into the pan. Press the pears in, stem end up. Bake for 40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the cake part comes out clean
Allow to cool in the pan, then gently remove the cake from the pan to a rack to cool completely
Very carefully melt the chocolate: Set a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, making sure the bowl doesn’t touch the water. Stir the chocolate in the bowl until melted. Using a spoon, drizzle the chocolate over the cake and create nice stripes on top
Let the chocolate dry for a bit and serve the cake in thick slices, with the reduced pear syrup poured on top
