Caramelized Pear Chocolate Upside-Down Cake? Sounds good to me! I wanted to make a dessert for after dinner tonight and found such an idea in my Rustic Fruit Desserts cookbook and immediately started salivating.I had some leftover hard caramels from a last week attempt to make soft caramels. Turns out my candy thermometer was defunct and we ended up with a toffee-ish substance. Tasty, but impossible to chew. So, instead of following the cookbook recipe, I just used it and my pseudo-caramels for some inspiration.
Melt caramels with a little water 'til melted through (or make some caramel sauce, not very difficult) pour into greased 9" cake pan, and let cool. Place sliced pears on top of caramel sauce and pour in chocolate cake batter right on top. (I had a boxed cake mix in the pantry that I used half of.) Bake at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Cool for 15, then flip onto plate for another 5. Lift off pan, and hurrah!
The caramely chocolate goodness is divine and the pears soften and brighten in color making you sure that springtime has indeed come.
