Line your baking tin with a baking parchment and grease the sides with some coconut fat. Preheat your oven to 180 Celsius degrees.

Place the hazelnuts in a food processor and pulverize to a fine meal.

Peel, half and core the pears.

Place a glass bowl over a saucepan with water on a medium heat and melt together the dark chocolate and coconut fat. Remove from the heat, let it cool a little and mix in the egg yolks, ground nuts and cocoa powder to a smooth texture.

In a separate bowl beat the *egg whites to soft peaks, then gradually add the sugar and keep beating to a firm but soft glossy peaks.

Gently fold in the beaten egg whites into the chocolate mixture.

Pour the batter into the prepared baking tin, arrange the pears, cut side down, over the batter. No need to press them down.

Bake for 35-40 minutes till the pears are fully baked and soft and cake is firm and springy. Remove from the oven and let it cool in the tin for 10-15 minutes before taking it out and transferring to a cake plate. It’s nice to serve this cake warm but room temperature is fine as well.

*to get a good volume, make sure the egg whites are at room temperature