yummy dessert

Pear Millefeuille

Ingredients (for three servings):
1 pear, very thinly sliced
a few teaspoons of sugar

apricot jam
cinnamon
lemon juice

155 g flour
100 g salted butter (or, if unsalted, add 1/4 tsp salt)
dish of ice water
[or, frozen puff pastry sheets would probably work just fine! just bake acc. to package instructions.]

creme fraiche
fresh mint leaves

1. Put the thinly sliced pears on a baking sheet. Sprinkle with sugar. Bake in oven at 90 degrees Celsius for about an hour; when one side gets nice and toasty, turn them over to the other side. Remove pears from baking sheet, preferably placing them on a cooling rack, and let them cool.

2. Put about 1/2 c apricot jam and 1/2 tsp cinnamon in a saucepan. Heat on low until the jam liquifies, then add lemon juice. Turn off heat; if the sauce congeals, just turn the burner on low to liquify it again.

3. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour and butter. Use a pastry blender (or subsitute forks...) to mix them together until the mixture forms coarse crumbs. Add one tablespoon of water at a time and blend it into the mixture. Only add just enough water to make the dough start sticking together - usually about 8 tbs. Put the pastry in plastic wrap/ a plastic bag, squeeze out all the air bubbles, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Roll out the dough about 1/4" thick on a lightly floured surface (a tall wine bottle works nicely as a rolling pin....). Cut out small circles and transfer to a baking sheet (a juice glass works well....) Bake at 190 degrees Celsius for 10-15 minutes, or until very lightly golden brown. Allow to cool.

4. Assemble the millefeuille in whatever way you think a millefeuille should be assembled. Just go for pretty layers. For mine, I dipped pear slices in the apricot mixture first. Then I layered a pastry circle, pear slices, a tsp of creme fraiche, a pastry circle, creme fraiche, pears, and a sprig of mint.
Any way you assemble them, they will be messy to eat.... So make sure you take a picture before you serve them! The mix of flavors and textures go together nicely - flaky pastry, chewy pears, sweet jam, creamy sort of yogurty creme fraiche.... I could definitely go for another batch!