Pear and almond Tart : frangipani frilliscious

Ok so here it is at last, the pear tart and the above variation was made for Valentine's Day.
And it was ever so scrumdidleyumptious I can assure you!!!
It's been a bit quiet I know and that's because in the ''real'' world we have been having many hassles and a few ''challenges'' such as we've not encountered before, but a promise is a promise so here's the recipe:
INGREDIENTS:
1 egg and 1 egg yolk
85 g castor sugar
85g ground almonds
35g plain flour
2.5ml almond extract ( 0.5 teasp)
425g frozen ready rolled puff pastry in 2 sheets at room temperature
350g firm pears such a about 2-3 Williams pears
70g smooth apricot jam


optional: flaked almonds - 20 g.

1. Preheat oven to 200 C or 180 if a fan oven.
Mix 70g of the almonds , the sugar , eggs and almond extract together in a bowl.
Roll out pastry onto baking sheet to a 25 cm square.
Roll out the other sheet to a rectangle of 28 by 23 cm and cut diagonally into 2.5 cm wide strips.

2 .Peel pears and cut into segments .
Spread the almond mixture onto the 25cm square pastry sheet and lay the sliced pear on top.
Arrange the pastry strips diagonally, twisting them as you lay them down and seal the edges to the base with a little water.
Then arrange some pastry strips around the edge also and crimp decoratively.( or flute)

3. Bake 30-35 min in oven until cooked and golden brown. take out of oven and let cool for 10 mins. Meanwhile melt jam in microwave with a little water for 1- 1.5 mins.
Brush pastry and pears with the melted jam as an all-over glaze.

Optional: sprinkle with flaked almonds.


Serve warm or cold with cream, ice-cream or custard.


Voila: quick, easy and sooooo DELICIOUS!

aH YES my fine stoneware bake stone broke but I have had it replaced by now.

I thought it looks like a river....

We enjoyed this view of Burlington House for 2.25 hours as we queued patiently for the VAN GOGH AND HiS LETTERS exhibition in half term. It was utterly FABULOUS and breathtaking and stunning and totally fascinating and totally worth every second of the queue.

I especially enjoyed reading the original letters in Dutch. ( my French was not quite up to the French ones...) And getting up so close to those reed pen drawings and the thickness of the amazing paint.....say no more.

Afterwrads we had a lovely stroll up Piccadilly and all the way along Regent St to Liberty and of course TOP SHOP at Oxford Circus.... The former for me and the latter for my daughters of course!!! On the way there was this lovely floral display of recycled materials!

Bye for now, not sure when life will permit a return to more regular blogging.....

Take care and my thoughts are with you even when I'm not blogging.