Halve and core the peeled pears and rub all over with lemon juice. Peel the pears only when you are ready to build the tart. If you don't have the time to poach the pears (or just don't want to), make sure that the pears you choose are ripe enough to eat. Drain and dry the pears well (reserving the poaching liquid if you like for other uses) before building the tart. If made the day before, the pears will continue to absorb the flavors you have added to the poaching liquid and will taste even better in the tart. Cooking time varies greatly depending on the variety and ripeness of the pears-start checking after 10 minutes for ripe pears.Ĭool and store the pears in the refrigerator in their poaching liquid. The pears are done when a small skewer or the tip of a knife will slide in and out of the pears without resistance. Press the round of parchment to the surface of the poaching liquid. The hole will allow the steam coming off of the barely simmering liquid to escape. Cut a round of parchment that is just larger than the surface area of the pan. To keep the pears submerged while they poach, prepare a parchment 'lid' (called a cartouche). Add the peeled, halved and cored pears and lower the heat to maintain a bare simmer. Bring this mixture to a boil and simmer for few minutes. For the tart pictured, I poached Bartlett pears and used a dry white wine and added a strip of lemon zest and a couple of cloves. If you like, you may add any number of flavorings of your choice (a strip or 2 of lemon or orange zest, a cinnamon stick, a couple of whole cloves, or a split and scraped vanilla bean). For 3 or 4 pears (such as Bartlett, Bosc or Anjou) place 4 cups of water (or half water and half white wine) in the saucepan and add 2 cups of sugar. To poach pears for the Pear & Frangipane Tart: Choose a saucepan large enough to hold the pears. (To illustrate, Madeleine Kamman points out that when cooked in pure water, an apple disintegrates, becoming applesauce.) The sugar sweetens the fruit and also helps to firm up the cell structure of the fruit so it will maintains its shape. The proportion of sugar needed in the syrup is technically related to the amount of sugar contained in the fruit in question, but for most fruits a syrup made up of half as much sugar by weight as liquid (water or a combination of water and wine) works well. The poaching liquid for fruit is a sugar syrup. To obtain this, the liquid should never boil, or simmer hard. For fruit, the goal is fruit that is tender through and is still holding its original shape. Whether you are poaching an egg, a piece of fish, or some fruit, you can't go wrong if you remember that poaching is a gentle cooking process.sort of the equivalent of a warm bath. Poaching pears isn't difficult.you just have to plan ahead. But if you have the time, the tart really is more flavorful and more elegant if the pears are poached. I would definitely make it and serve it without apology if I were pressed for time. There is nothing wrong with the fresh pear tastes good and it looks beautiful. And since I add a bit of white wine and some clove and citrus zest to my poaching liquid, there is an added dimension of flavor that the fresh pear version lacks. Every bite seems to be somehow more perfumed with the aromatic flavor of the pears.

In the end, I discovered that the tart really is better when made with the poached pears.at least, in my opinion. This didn't make a tart as uniformly beautiful as usual, but I really didn't need to eat two whole tarts this week.(not that I really need to eat one whole tart either.) Rather than making two tarts for a side by side comparison, I decided to make just one tart with poached pears on one half and fresh on the other. Because I wanted to see if there was enough of a difference between the tart made with fresh and the tart made with poached to warrant poaching the pears, I thought I would give the fresh pear version a try before I taught my class. I have never made it this way, but it makes sense to me that fresh pears would work just fine since the frangipane would absorb the juices of the pears as they bake. Some recipes for this tart call for fresh pears. But it is also commonly made with high quality canned pears (packed in syrup). My favorite way to make this tart is with pears that I have poached myself. A classic for a reason, it is truly wonderful. If you have spent any time in France.and you like pears and/or is likely you have tasted this tart. In the pear tart it shares the stage equally with the pears. In the galette, the frangipane is somewhat of a background player. I think I mentioned in my recent Peach & Raspberry Galette post that I think frangipane is one of the finest things to ever come out of the French pastry kitchen. One of the things I will be teaching is Pear & Frangipane tart. I have a pies and tarts class coming up next week.

Old pear tart recipe easy