Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Pear Almond Tart


I know it's such a cliche, but I do love the combo of pears and almonds, sweet and crunchy. Once again this tart was born from the farmers market excursion. There were pears there that I hadn't heard of the description read: 'Conference Pears: Pale yellow flesh tinged with pink. Tastes like the best canned pears when fresh'. Seriously how could I pass these up? My curiosity was piqued when I read tastes like the best canned pears. Now, I don't know about you, but to me a good canned pear is sweet, supple and a little firm. These were as they described, they smelled incredibly good. 

I made a simple pate sucre dough and then got the recipe for a pear almond tart from the March Gourmet magazine. I simple chopped up the pear into slim slices and baked them after I had baked the crust to a golden brown, right on top of the crust. Then I poured on the custard, baked that, then I added chopped roasted almonds, sugar and egg whites then popped it in the oven. 

Unfortunately, after I had cooled down the tart I placed it on a wooden chopping board that had at some time in it's past had onions cut on it. So to me the tart tasted very like pears and onion- not a great combo. However, other people did tell me it was good! 

4 comments:

Haley said...

look at you exercising those pastry skills!

rhid said...

I know - I'm crazy about tarts!

Apuch said...

We are thinking about planting two pear trees behind the bakery so I am researching for the best pears for tarts, sorbets (maybe in future) etc. Would you say that the texture of the pear held up during baking?

rhid said...

Unfortunatly it has been a long time since I made this tart. I think they were alright, I don't recall them being brilliant but they didn't fall apart in the tart. So texture wise they worked, taste wise I don't recall unfortunatly!

Good luck!