Open Faced Pie In Your Face

So, half way through studying for my fluid mechanics final, I realized I needed to write a blog post. And the only thing in my fridge is a jar of pickles, a bag of dried out baby carrots, and half a bottle of wine.

I did however have three very ripe pears...

Pear Tart

(yup, that's all the intro you get; it's finals time)

What you need:

• 1/3 c butter
• 1/3 c sugar
• 2/3 c flour
• 3 pears
• 1 tbsp wine

Okay, I thought I was being extremely clever with all of the threes until I realized I'd managed to lose my 1/3 cup measure. How the hell does someone lose a measuring cup?? And no, it's not buried somewhere in a stack of dirty dishes. I actually washed them all yesterday. :P

What you gotta do:

Preheat the oven to 400.

Make sure your butter is very soft. Cream it with the sugar.

If you wanted to do some fancy tricks with this, try a bit of lemon or lime zest in here. You could also replace up to half the butter with cream cheese if you have any. I didn't.

I really hate measuring dry stuff in my liquid measure. Liquid measuring cups are made for liquids. No, I'm not just being fussy. They're designed to account for the surface tension of liquids and how it affects how we see and perceive the level in the cup.

Mix in the flour until just combined. Your dough should be soft and sticky and you should need a bit of flour on your hands as you press it down onto the parchment.

Mine was a bit too dry. I'd like to blame it on the cup, but I may end up having to cut the flour down to 1/2 cup. Try it that way. Let me know how it works.

Peel and slice your pears. If you want to be all fancy with them, and try to segment the to get all the wedges the same size, that's your choice. Me, I'm okay with different sizes. It's "rustic". Yeah, rustic. We'll call it that.

Toss the pear slices in a bowl with the wine, or lemon juice, or lime juice. Lemon juice on the pears and lemon zest in the crust would work nicely, I think. I didn't have lemon. I had booze.

Pile the pears on the crust in as artful, or as "rustic" (not messy, rustic) a manner as you want or have patience for.

Bake this at 400 for about 20 minutes. The crust will be nice and browned, the pears soft and juicy and just starting to brown a bit on top.

Pull the parchment off the cookie sheet and onto a cooling rack. This giant pear covered cookie (really, that's kinda what it is) will be very soft. Let it cool to room temperature before you even think about cutting it.

(do some calculus while you wait)

If you don't have any cream to whip, a bit of thick vanilla yogurt works just fine.

What's your favourite kind of pie?

Comments

[Taneasha]

I've lost measuring cups before! Look in all of your dry ingredient containers/packages. That's where I usually end up finding mine. Inside the flour canister or something.

I will totally be doing this, btw. Pears on basically a shortbread crust... sounds fabulous to me. I think ground almonds in the crust and sliced ones sprinkled on top would be just the thing. I love almonds and pears together.

[The Wife]

I lose measuring cups all the time. Usually in the bag of flour (we buy it in GIANT bags, so it's easy to get lost in there). That and my house is such a clusterfu... of stuff that it's easy to lose just about anything in it!

Anyway, my favorite pie is probably pineapple pie. I started making it when I was a tween, and won first prize in the pie division at my local agricultural fair. It's like any fruit pie, but with pineapple instead of cherry or blueberry. I do usually have some trouble getting the pineapple filling to solidify. Mainly because I won't use tapioca, because I HATE tapioca. But it always tastes good.

[Natalie Ainge]

My mouth just violently watered! I <3 pie more than just about anything in the world...

[angel]

I would so eat this! Looks and sounds good!