Pear and Chocolate Bundt Cake Adventure
I used to get angry at recipes that called for a stand mixer, mumbling some expletives before turning off my phone. It seemed like only newlyweds and professional bakers got to have these magic machines. Then Black Friday rolled around.
On a whim, Guillaume and I looked at a few sites and found a deep discount on a really nice stand mixer. When my attempt to order it didn’t go through, he raced to his computer to try. Immediately, no questions asked. And that, I’m pretty sure, is true love.
A few weeks later the gleaming chrome machine arrived on the doorstep. Unpacking it together that December morning over coffee felt like Christmas had come early.
“But where on earth are you going to store it?” my mom asked. A good question considering the crammed state of the cabinets.
“In a place of honor,” I replied. And it’s true. When not in use on the kitchen counter, the stand mixer gets stored right next to the liquor bottles, crystal muddling pourer, and Boston shaker.
The debut recipe, Deb Perelman’s version of Al Di La’s bittersweet chocolate and pear cake involved a lot of firsts. We’d never attempted this cake or anything quite like it before. I’d never intentionally browned butter. And this baking coincided with my first time making Cincinnati chili from scratch, which was simmering on the stovetop. Coincidentally one of our friends, Cheryl, came over and it’s a good thing, too because there was an insane amount of chili.
Lacking a springform cake tin (at that point), I decided to try the recipe in a classic nonstick Bundt pan after reading a bunch of the Smitten Kitchen comments.
Browning butter, it turns out, involves a bit of patience. Cheryl says it’s done when you feel like it’s brown and nutty enough. “Taste it!” she suggested. We all did. Oh boy that’s dangerous stuff.
Unfortunately the printer had left off a key section of Deb’s recipe and we didn’t discover it until too late. My helpers had also had a bit of wine before dinner so they were perhaps a little too enthusiastic in advising me. Rather than alternating the ingredients, they all got dumped in at once.
Nevertheless this cake was ridiculously delicious. It came out of the Bundt pan like a dream, which also completely hid where some sinking had occurred. With pears still in season, I made the cake two more times over the following weeks. Here is the recipe, which I’ve tweaked slightly:
High Altitude Chocolate and Pear Bundt Cake
1 C. all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
3 eggs, at room-temperature
1 stick unsalted butter
¾ C. sugar
3 mostly ripe Anjou pears, peeled, in a small dice
¾ C. bittersweet chocolate chunks
¼ C. whipping cream whipped with ⅛ tsp. almond extract OR powdered sugar
Preheat oven to 350°F.
Grease and flour (or use Baker’s Joy) a 9-inch springform pan or nonstick Bundt pan.
You can put the eggs in a bowl of warm water for several minutes if you're taking them out of the fridge and don't have time to bring them to room temperature. Just pat them dry before cracking them open.
In a medium-sized mixing bowl, sift the flour, baking powder, and salt together, set aside. Measure out sugar into a small bowl and set aside. Measure out chocolate in a small bowl and set aside. Put the butter in a medium-sized pan on the stovetop but don’t turn it on yet. Peel, core, and dice the pears.
Using a stand mixer with the whisk attachment, whip the eggs on medium-high until pale and very thick, about 5 minutes at altitude.
Brown the butter: Turn the heat on medium to melt the butter. Keep stirring and monitor it closely. Once it starts foaming, turn down the heat to medium-low. It helps to frequently scrape the solids off the bottom of the pan in the last couple minutes to ensure even browning. Should be nutty and brown. Set aside.
Add the sugar to the eggs and whip a few minutes more. Just as the mixture is starting to lose volume, turn the mixture down to “stir.” Add ⅓ of the flour mixture, then half the butter, ⅓ of the flour, the remaining butter, and the rest of flour. Whisk until barely combined, turn off machine, then use a spatula to gently fold the batter until the ingredients are combined. Don’t over-whisk or over-fold.
Pour into prepared pan. Sprinkle the pear and chocolate chunks over the top, and bake until the cake is golden brown and springs back to the touch, about 35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool for about 20 minutes on a rack then turn out onto a plate.
Whip cream with almond extract and put a dollop on warm slices to serve. Or dust with powdered sugar right before serving.
