Our neighbour popped-in with a large bag of pears from a tree in their garden.
They were conference pears, very small and still very hard. I was very grateful of course, but wondered how I was going to use them.
Meanwhile, I bought a Marcus Wareing book (second-hand), ‘One Perfect Ingredient – three ways to cook it’. Should be right up my street. (I do like the idea of thinking about cooking single ingredients in different ways for culinary enlightenment, as testified by my 3-way ventures with octopus and artichokes.) The best photo in the book is of a pear tart – where, rather like blackbirds, the pears are poking out from the frangipane attracting attention with their dark stalks sticking up in the air! I was tempted to copy this, but realised that I needed new baking rings and a very different type of pear.
I decided on my own pattern – the tarts don’t look too bad and according to Mrs WDC, were ‘seriously good’. We gave one of our tarts to our neighbours, who were delighted to see their pears returned in this new sweet format.