Another Dessert Recipe

So I really like making sweets at Christmastime! Recently, my husband bought a box of pears from a friend that benefited her daughter's school (a good cause) but that now leaves me with about 20 pears (after giving some away). I don't even eat raw pears! Luckily, I found a recipe that a friend gave me a few years ago for a "Pear and Chocolate Cream Tart." I had it at her house and it was reeeaaaally good. So I am going to try making it tomorrow and thought I'd share the recipe with anyone else who might be interested. This is a bit more involved than my brownie recipe, but worth the effort!

Pear and Chocolate Cream Tart
serves 6-8

9-inch tart pan lined with chocolate pastry (recipe below)
4 oz. semisweet chocolate, melted
1 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 tsp vanilla or almond extract
3 ripe pears

1) In a saucepan over low heat, melt chocolate, cream, and half the sugar, stirring frequently, until smooth. Remove from heat and cool slightly. Beat in the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla or almond extract and spread evenly in pastry shell, set on a cookie sheet.
2) Preheat a 375 degree oven. Peel the pears, then halve, and core them. Put them on a work surface cut-side down and cut crosswise into thin slices.
3) Arrange pears spoke fashion in the pastry shell and press gently with the heel of your hand to fan out pear slices toward the center. Tap tart gently on the work surface to eliminate air bubbles.
4) Bake for 10 minutes. Reduce oven temp. to 350 degrees. Sprinkle surface of the tart with the remaining sugar and bake until custard is set and pears are tender and glazed, about 20 minutes more. Transfer to a wire rack to cool slightly. Serve warm.

Chocolate pastry

8 Tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1/3 cup superfine sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1) Put butter, sugar, salt and vanilla into bowl of food processor fitted with a metal blade and process for 25 to 30 seconds. Add cocoa and process, about 1 minutes. Add flour all at once and process for 10-15 seconds until it is well blended. Turn pastry out on to a sheet of plastic wrap and shape into a flat circle. Wrap and refrigerate 1 hour.
2) Soften pastry for 10-15 minutes at room temp. Unwrap and sandwich between two large pieces of plastic wrap. Carefully roll out to 11-inch round, about 1/4 inch thick. Peel off top sheet and invert pastry into a greased tart tin. Gently ease pastry on to the bottom and sides of the tin, then remove the bottom layer of wrap. Press pastry into tin, then cut off any excess. Prick base of pastry with a fork and chill for 1 hour.
3) Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Blind bake for 10 minutes weighting pastry with a layer of foil and dried beans. Then remove foil and beans and bake for 5 more minutes until just set. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Enjoy! Merry Christmas!