Baked Sunday Mornings: Whiskey Pear Tart

I have made this week's Baked Sunday Mornings assignment, the Whiskey Pear Tart, several times before; I previously posted about it here. But I have never tried this tart with fresh pears, as I've never made it during pear season. Even with canned pears, it's very tasty -- almond cream topped with pears, with whiskey throughout. I wouldn't have had any reservations about using canned pears again, except that I saw some gorgeous pears at the farmer's market last weekend, and I figured I should try poaching my own.

This tart is a two-day project. On day one, I poached the pears and made the crust. I wasn't really thinking ahead, and the gorgeous pears I bought were Comice pears -- supercreamy, very sweet, quite juicy, and ill-suited to poaching and cooking. I forged ahead anyway. I was doubling the recipe to make two tarts, so I used six pears. I didn't feel like breaking out a bottle of wine for the poaching liquid, so I used water with honey, fresh-squeezed orange juice, orange zest, a cinnamon stick, and star anise. Because the pears were perfectly ripe and so creamy to begin with, they were nice and soft after I poached them for only about 5 minutes.

After I took out the pears, I reduced the poaching liquid to about a cup and a half and saved it for the glaze. I then soaked the pears overnight in a mixture of lemon juice, whiskey, sugar, and vanilla. I quickly made the crust in the food processor (sugar, flour, salt, cold butter, and egg), wrapped it up, and kept it in the fridge overnight as well.

On day two, I rolled out the tart dough and blind-baked the crusts. I know from experience that the recipe produces more dough than is necessary to fill a 14-inch by 4-inch tart pan, so with my double recipe of dough, I made two rectangular tarts: one was 14 by 4 inches, and the other was 12 by 8 inches. After the crusts had cooled, I filled them with an almond cream made from butter, almond paste, egg, cornstarch, and whiskey. (I used a little extra almond paste -- a double batch of almond cream requires nine ounces of almond paste and I had a 10-oz. can, so I just used the entire thing). You arrange the drained pears on top of the almond cream and bake. The final step is to brush on a whiskey glaze made from the reserved poaching liquid combined with the soaking liquid, reduced and thickened with a little cornstarch, with a little more whiskey added in.

This tart is definitely better with fresh pears, although this might have something to do with the fact that I think Comice pears are much tastier than Barletts, the variety you get in the can. Maybe it was just the halo effect from the delicious pears, but I also found the rest of the tart to be superior to previous iterations. In particular, I couldn't get enough of the buttery, cookie-like crust, and the almond cream was particularly heavenly. The taste and texture of the cream reminded me of the inside of an almond croissant, which just might be my favorite baked good of all time. Of course, as someone who doesn't drink at all and who dislikes the taste of alcohol, the whiskey flavor was not a selling point for me. But while I kept thinking how much better this tart would taste without the alcohol, the whiskey flavor was a highlight for others.

I kept this tart at room temperature for almost 24 hours and didn't have any problems with the crust becoming soggy. I kept a leftover piece in the refrigerator for the second day, and the crust was still crisp and delicious after 48 hours. I've very glad that being part of Baked Sunday Mornings gave me a reason to make this tart again, because after making it with fresh pears, I'm seeing it in a new and more delicious light!

Recipe: "Whiskey Pear Tart" from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito. Recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.

Previous Post: "Canned Pears Go High Class: Whiskey Pear Tart," July 1, 2011.