Bittersweet Chocolate And Pear Cake - flour

Method

• Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter a 9-inch springform pan and dust with flour, set aside.
• Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together, set aside.
• Using a mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whip the eggs on high speed until pale and very thick. (it will likely take nine minutes to get sufficient volume)
• While the eggs are whipping, brown the butter. Melt the butter in a medium saucepan and cook it until the butter browns and smells nutty (about 6 to 8 minutes), scraping the solids off the bottom of the pan frequently in the last couple minutes to ensure even browning. Remove from the flame but keep in a warm spot.
• Add the sugar to the eggs and whip a few minutes more.
• Just as the egg-sugar mixture is starting to loose volume, turn the mixture down to stir, and add the flour mixture and brown butter. Add one third of the flour mixture, then half of the butter, a third of the flour, the remaining butter, and the rest of flour. Whisk until just barely combined - no more than a minute from when the flour is first added - and then use a spatula to gently fold the batter until the ingredients are combined. It is very important not to over-whisk or fold the batter or it will lose volume.
• 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 30 minutes*, or a tester comes out clean.