#CakeSliceBakers ~ Hidden Pear Cake

Each month The Cake Slice Bakers are offered a selection of cakes from the current book we are baking through. This year it is The New Way To Cake by Benjamina Ebuehi. We each choose one cake to bake, and then on the 20th - never before - we all post about our cake on our blogs. There are a few rules that we follow, but the most important ones are to have fun and enjoy baking & eating cakes! Follow our Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest pages where you can find all of our cakes, as well as inspiration for many other cakes. You can also click on the thumbnail pictures below to take you to each of our cakes. If you have a blog and are interested in joining The Cake Slice Bakers and baking along with us, please send an email to thecakeslicebakers at gmail dot com for more details. The Cake Slice Bakers also have a new Facebook group called The Cake Slice Bakers and Friends. This group is perfect for those who do not have a blog but want to join in the fun and bake through this book.

It is a new year and a new book - The New Way To Cake - and our choices for February 2020 were ~

Hidden Pear Cake

• Camille Cooks
• Making Miracles
• Sweet Sensations

Cardamom Cake with Mulled Wine Jam

• Culinary Adventures with Camilla
• Karen's Kitchen Stories
• A Little Bit of All Right

Flourless Chocolate-Chili Cake

• All That's Left Are The Crumbs
• My Recipe Reviews

This cake is really wonderful! I had no idea what to expect - I've never made anything quite like this. I've never used ginger beer and certainly never cooked a whole pear into a cake before. This whole dessert is really delightful. The crystalized ginger adds such a brightness, and those deeply infused poached pears are so fragrant, tender, and crammed full of ginger flavor. The texture of the cake is almost quick bread like, a wonderful crust, and moist and tender on the interior. There's nothing about this I would change. This cake really comes together quickly and isn't fussy, but what a beautiful dessert to place on your table!

Hidden Pear Cake from Benjamina Ebuehi (The New Way to Cake)

Ingredients

Poached Pears
3-4 cups ginger beer
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 cinnamon sticks
2 cardamom pods
3 small Bosch pears (peeled, stems in tact)

Batter
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup butter, softened
2/3 cup light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp molasses
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 TBS finely chopped crystalized ginger

Directions

1. Combine all pear poaching ingredients in a medium pot on the stove, lay in the pears and bring to a low simmer. Cover with a lid and simmer for 20-30 minutes, until they are tender enough to piece with a fork with a little bit of pressure applied. Drain and discard liquid, and set pears aside while you prepare the batter.
2. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees and spray a loaf pan generously with baking spray.
3. Combine dry ingredients in a medium bowl: flour and baking powder. Whisk gently to combine and set aside.
4. In the bowl of a stand mixer, blend the butter and brown sugar for 2-3 minutes until well combined, creamy, and lightened in color. Add in the eggs, one a time, mixing well between additions, scraping down the sides as needed.
5. Add in the molasses and vanilla extract and blend until combined. 
6. Alternate the dry ingredients with the milk, blending slowly until combined. Finish blending with a spatula, don't over mix the batter.
7. Scrape the batter into a loaf pan and spread gently to even out. 
8. Cut the bottoms off the pears so they sit flat and line them up in the batter (stems up), pressing down gently / wiggling them into the batter.
9. Bake 15 minutes, then check and straighten up the pears if they've fallen over.
10. Bake a total of 50-65 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Allow to rest for 15-20 minutes before removing from the pan and allow to complete cooling on a rack.