Preheat the oven to 160 degrees and grease the sides of your cake tin.

In a small saucepan gently melt together the brown sugar and 50g of butter for the topping.

Pour into the cake tin and spread evenly.

Carefully place in the pear slices, covering as much of the tin as you can.

In a large mixing bowl cream together the 170g butter for the cake and caster sugar until light and fluffy (this takes 2 minutes with an electric whisk, and a little longer by hand).

Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding the vanilla with the last egg.

sift in the flour and baking powder and mix until well combined and smooth.

Pour over the pears.

Bake in the oven for 35 minutes, until golden brown and cooked in the centre (test to see if a skewer comes out clean).

Cool in the tin for 10 minutes, before very carefully tipping out on to a plate, so that the pears ore on the top.