Oh, pears and pecans, the taste of winter. Adding sour cream to your cake mix will give it a soft and fluffy texture. Our pear and pecan cake is perfect, served straight from the oven with some cream.

MAKES 1 cake // COOKING TIME 90 min

INGREDIENTS
250g butter, at room temperature
185g sugar
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla essence
1½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
240g flour
½ cup sour cream
2 pears, cored and grated
100g pecans, roughly chopped, plus extra to decorate
Icing sugar, for dusting

METHOD
1. Preheat oven to 180°C and grease a 20 cm Bundt tin.
2. Place butter and sugar in a large bowl. Using an electric mixer on high speed, or a wooden spoon, beat for 8 minutes, or until light and fluffy.
3. Add eggs 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Then, add the vanilla essence, baking powder and salt. Add the flour a little at a time, beating after each addition, until just combined. Be careful not to over-mix.
4. Gently mix the sour cream, pears and pecans into the batter, then spoon into the tin.
5. Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
6. Allow to cool, then remove from the tin.
7. Dust with icing sugar and sprinkle with extra pecans.