French Pear Tart with Almond Cream

This week, I got out of my baking slump and made Dorie Greenspan's French Pear Tart from Baking: From My Home to Yours. I got this book a couple months ago, and even though there are a million things in it I want to make, this is the first thing I've made. Dorie posted the recipe for this tart on her website as well.


I used the Sweet Tart Dough from the book for the crust, and it was really simple and easy. For the pears, I used jarred pears from Trader Joe's. I would have liked to try poaching my own pears, but it was a weeknight and I didn't feel like the extra effort. Plus Dorie says that canned pears are generally used for these tarts.


The recipe for the almond cream calls for blanched almonds, but all I had were raw almonds. So I figured that it couldn't make too much of difference, and I don't think it really did, except that my cream was a little darker than if I had used the blanched. My favorite part of this was the almond cream, it was delicious.


French Pear Tart
from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan

6 canned pear halves, drained or 3 ripe but firm medium pears, poached
3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup ground blanched almonds
2 teaspoons all-purpose flour
1 tsp cornstarch
1 large egg
2 tsp dark rum or 1 tsp vanilla extract
1 9-inch tart shell with Sweet Tart Dough, partially baked and cooled
Confectioners' sugar, for dusting

If you want to poach your own pears, see Dorie's blog for instructions.

First make the Almond Cream. Mix the butter and sugar in a food processor until smooth. Add the almonds and continue to process. Then add the flour and cornstarch and mix. Finally add the egg and process until completely smooth. Add the rum or vanilla. Use the cream right away, or refrigerate until ready to use.

Preheat the oven to 350ºF with the rack in the center. If using poached pears, cut them in half. If using canned pears, pat them dry. Spread the almond cream in the baked crust. Take each pear half and make several thin slices crosswise across the half. Pick up the sliced pear with a spatula and then push down on the pear to fan it out. Then put the pear on top of the almond cream with the wider bottom part of the pear towards the outside. Repeat with each half.

Place the tart on a baking sheet and bake for 5o to 60 minutes. The almond cream should be puffy and light brown. Cool the tart on a wire rack. Before serving, dust with confectioners' sugar.

Sweet Tart Dough
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick plus 1 tbsp unsalted butter, very cold and cut into small pieces
1 large egg yolk

Pulse the flour, sugar, and salt in food processor to combine. Drop the butter pieces over the flour mixture, and pulse until the mixture is coarsely combined. Stir the yolk with a fork, then add it slowly to the food processor. Pulse for 10 second intervals until the dough becomes clumpy. Dump the dough onto a work surface and with your hands knead the dough for a few seconds to combine it all.

Butter a 9-inch tart pan, and press the dough into the bottom and sides of the pan. Save a small piece of dough in case the crust cracks during baking and you need to patch it up. Freeze the crust for at least half an hour before baking.

To partially bake the crust, preheat the oven to 375ºF with the rack in the center. Butter some aluminum foil and press it tightly on the crust. Bake for 25 minutes. Cool in the pan on a wire rack. If the crust has cracked, patch it up with the reserved dough.