Walnut-pear sour cream cake

This is one of my go-to cakes.

I have made it for teas and baby showers.

I have made it for potlucks and sit-down dinner parties.

I have made it for stamping brunches and just to take to work and share.

I like the pears. They are a bit unexpected. Most people would expect apple, I think.

Usually I get whatever pears look best. This time I used Bartletts.

Oh, and my recipe is modified from the BH&G one. I like more nuts and more topping. So I upped the amounts of those.

My modified version is below.

If you don't want it so nutty, click here for the non-modified version.

Walnut-Pear Sour Cream Cake

(based on Better Homes and Gardens Magazine - October 1999)

(topping and filling)

2 cups broken walnuts

2/3 cup packed brown sugar

2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 cup butter

2/3 cup all-purpose flour

(cake)

2-3 medium pears, peeled, cored and sliced (about 2 cups)

2 tsp. lemon juice

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup granulated sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

2 eggs

1 8-oz. carton dairy sour cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9-inch springform pan or 9x9x2-inch baking pan.
(I like a springform because it looks so pretty on the plate when you take it out of the pan.)

Combine the nuts, brown sugar and cinnamon.

For topping, cut the 1/2 cup butter into 2/3 cup flour to make coarse crumbs. Stir in 1 1/2 cups of the nut mixture.

Set nut mixture and the topping aside.

For cake:

Toss pears with lemon juice; set aside.

In a medium bowl combine the 1 3/4 cups flour, baking powder, soda and salt; set aside.

In a large bowl beat 1/2 cup butter with electric mixer 30 seconds. Beat in granulated sugar and vanilla.

Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each.

Add flour mixture and sour cream alternately to batter. Beat on low speed after each addition until combined.

Spread two-thirds of the batter batter into the prepared pan. Sprinkle with reserved nut mixture.

Layer pears over top.

Gently spread remaining batter over pears.

Sprinkle with reserved topping.

Bake 45 to 50 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Cool in pan on a rack 10 minutes.

Remove side of springform pan, if using.

Cool at least 1 hour.

Serve warm with whipped cream, if desired.

Serves 12.

Refrigerate any leftovers.

Now, I like the whipped cream idea just fine.

But even better is to take some extra sour cream, mix in a bit of milk to make it more like a sauce and add a bit of brown sugar.

It should be a bit sweet, just to take the edge off the sour cream. But not too sweet. The cake is sweet enough.

Then I drizzle that over the cake.

Yummmmm!