Double crust pear pie - 'Cook More'

Helloo,

This is the blog post with the proper recipe for the pudding in my last video (link in the previous post) it’s basically a pear pie with a layer of marzipan goodness between it and the pastry. It’s from the Great British Bake Off ‘How to turn everyday bakes into Showstoppers’ book, which I got for Christmas a couple of years ago and haven’t used much, but I’m really glad that I did for this. 

Ingredients:

For the pastry

300g plain flour

Pinch of salt

3 tbsp sugar

175g butter, chilled and diced

1 large egg, beaten

1 tbsp ice-cold water

For the filling

225g marzipan, diced

100g butter, softened  and diced

2 tbsp plain flour

2 large eggs, beaten

4 large pears

Put flour, salt and sugar in a food processor and just ‘pulse’ a few times to mix them up. Then pop in the butter and process until it looks likes breadcrumbs. Add in the egg and water through the feed tube whilst the machine is running until the mix starts forming a soft dough, check it’s consistency before adding any extra water though, because it may not actually form a “ball” of dough; just make sure it’s not sticky and you can always compress it with your hands. Make the dough into a ball and wrap it in cling film before putting it into the fridge for 15 minutes. When rolling it out, cut off 2 fifths for the top and roll out the rest for the base, before putting it in a pie dish. Don’t cut off the excess pastry from the edges.

To make the filling, put marzipan and butter in a food processor and blend till smooth. The add the flour and eggs and process again until mixture is lovely and creamy. Spoon this into the pastry case and spread it out. Slice up the pears and lay them on top of the marzipan mix, to fill up the pie. Roll out the remaining 2 fifths of the pastry to just bigger than the circumference of the pie dish. Lightly brush the rim of the pastry case with cold water and then roll the pastry lid over a rolling pin and unroll over the pie. Press the edges together to seal the pie and cut off the excess pastry. You can decorate and finish the pie however you like, but make sure you put three slits in the top so it doesn’t explode in the oven. Put the pie dish on a pre-heated baking tray in the oven at 190°C for 40-45 minutes and leave to cool for 15 minutes before slicing.

Not to blow my own trumpet or anything, but this really did taste brilliant. Marzipan and pears were a match made in heaven, and it tastes petty grand cold, too.

  

Aand that’s it! See you next time, and let me know how you go if you try this :)

Love,

        Georgia