TWD - French Pear Tart

Can I just say....."I am some kind of proud of ME!!"

I made this....

Yep....me.  Saweeeet, huh!

This weeks Tuesdays With Dorie recipe was a French Pear Tart and was chosen by none other than Dorie, herself.  Yes, you heard me right.  The cookbook author, in honor of TWD's 1st year anniversary, played along with the rest of us this week, and picked a recipe that had me shaking in my shoes.

This is exactly the reason I joined this group....to get out of my baking comfort zone, where only brownies and cookies reside, and into the world of French Pear Tarts.  

I started by reading the recipe about 50 times and checking out all of the comments by the other bakers on the TWD site.  After that, I was still sure that I'd screw this up, but I went for it anyway.

The recipe said that you could either use canned pears (really??) or poach fresh pears.  I opted for the poaching route, which was the least intimidating aspect of the task!  Even I can peel pears and boil liquid  :)

The next step was the crust.  Aaack.  I don't do crust....I buy crust.  However, Publix didn't have a frozen "Sweet Tart Dough".  Shit.  Anyhoo, I made the crust in the food processor, so that wasn't a big deal....no kneading involved.....but pressing it into the tart pan was challenging.  As hard as I had to work getting it in there, I was sure it was never coming out.  I put it into the freezer for an hour, as instructed; lined it with foil and partially baked it.

It came out looking OK....so far, so good.

Next was the almond cream filling, which was also done in the food processor.  The recipe said to process the butter and sugar until the mixture is "satiny and smooth".  Ummm....never got the "satiny and smooth".  I, instead, got a big butter-sugar ball plastered against the side of my food processor.  I had read the someone else had this problem so I just ignored it and it turned out fine!

The only thing left to do was cut the pears, assemble and bake.  Thanks to whoever posted the picture of how to cut the pears....quite helpful.

And this is what came out of the oven!!

Mr. B was home so he got a piece and "Mr. Chocolate Lover" really liked it.  So did Charlotte and Jenny!  SUCCESS!

Like I mentioned, I'm pretty proud of myself that I made something this pretty and delicious.  I think I would definitely make this again, but only when I could show it off to lots of friends!

Thanks again to Dorie for participating and creating this wonderful tart.  You can click on the link above to check out Dorie's website and also see the recipe.  Also check out the TWD site to see what all the other baker's did with this and to read the Q&A with Dorie.