Cookie's Kitchen: Poached Pear and frangipane tart

Dear Readers,

Apologies for the long break but I am happy to say I am back to blogging and very excited to be sharing my culinary discoveries with all of you once again. It has been a glorious winter in Sydney, not too cold and lots of sunshine. Lots of lovely winter fruit and an abundance of pears particularly this season.

I have teamed up beautifully poached pears with a frangipane tart encased in a sour cream pastry - sounds divine right! The frangipane tart recipe has been adapted from our very own Australian cooking queen Maggie Beer. Needless to say it's a great recipe with lip smacking results. You can personalize it with a fruit of your choice, berries will work well and so will apricots, just be creative with the fruits in season and you will have a winner in your hands. A word of advise - make extra while entertaining as everyone will want seconds :)

Love,

Recipe Print Recipe

Adapted from Maggie Beer's Apricot frangipane tart recipe
Serves 6-8

Ingredients

Sour cream pastry

200 g Chilled unsalted butter- cut into cubes

250 g Plain flour

1/2 cup Sour cream

Frangipane Filling

120 g Unsalted butter

120 g Caster Sugar

2 eggs

120 g Almond Meal

30 g Plain flour

Poached Pears
3-4 Pears
500 ml or 2 cups port wine or any red wine of your choice
1/2 cup water
1 Cinnamon quill
2-3 Star Anise
1 vanilla bean (split lengthways)
1/3 cup sugar

Method

For the Poached Pears
In a deep pot combine the wine, water, sugar and spices and let it simmer. Peel and core the pears and place them in the simmering liquid. Let the pears cook for approximately 45-60 minutes or till tender. I usually cover the pot with a round sheet of baking paper with a small hole in the middle, it speeds up the process.

Once the pears have cooked, take them out and let them cool. The wine mixture should have reduced to a sticky syrup like consistency. This syrup is great to pour over the poached fruit tart afterwards.

For the Sour Cream Pastry
Pulse the butter and flour in a food processor till you get a coarse breadcrumb resembling mixture. Pour the sourcream and pulse till it is combined.

Pulsing butter and flour for the pastry

Now take the dough and shape it into a disc and place it between two sheets of baking paper. Roll the pastry to approx 5mm thickness and then transfer it to a flat tray and place it in the freezer for about 10-15 minutes.

Pastry dough

Line a 24 cm loose bottomed tart tin with the pastry and then place the tin for another 10 minutes in the freezer to set.

Tart tin with pastry

Preheat oven to 180 degree Celsius. Line the pastry tin with baking paper and pie weights and let it blind bake for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes remove the baking paper and weights and let the pastry cook for another 5-10 minutes till it is golden in colour. Set the tart case aside to cool.

For the Frangipane Filling
Beat the butter and sugar till it is pale, thick and fluffy. Add one egg at a time and continue to beat the mixture. Add a tsp of vanilla and then fold in the flour and almond meal till it is just combined. Pour the mixture into the cooled tart tin and smooth the top with a spatula.

Frangipane filling in blind baked and cooled pastry

Now it's time to be a little fancy with the carving of the pears. I have scored the pear diagonally and flattened it so that it fans beautifully. You can choose to cut halves and place them in the filling. Place the pears on top of the frangipane filling and press them down gently. Brush the pears with the sticky wine syrup to give a final flourish.