pear recipe n° 1. this is the first thing i did with the pears of our hedge. while waiting for the pears i had a lot of time to collect ideas what to do with them once they are mellow. the baked pears in pastry with dark chocolate and almonds have been my personal priority number one.i found the recipe in the jamie oliver book: jamie´s kitchen and could not resist the beauty of this creation.

the pastry you see is a very thin filo pastry. what you can´t see on the picture is the little secret of the baked pear inside. they are filled over and over with dark chocolate and grounded almonds. the crunchiness outside and the herb but sweet dark chocolate and almond combination goes perfectly with the light sour fruitiness of our pears.

you can have the baked pears for tea or as a desert, but be aware of their richness. if you will have them for desert it is better to plan a light main course as a balance.

 4 pears
40 g blanched and grounded almonds
150 g butter
50 g sugar
zest of one orange and some juice
1 vanilla pod, seeded
70 g dark chocolate
filo pastry

preheat your oven to 170° C. cover a baking tray with some baking paper.

peel the pears and remove the core. therefor make a hole from the bottom of the pears. the size of the hole depends a bit on the size of your pears. but take care that it is as big as much filling you like.

to prepare the filling, add the grounded almonds together with 70 g butter, sugar, zest of the orange and vanilla seeds in a large bowl and combine. add some orange juice to the mixture. in the original recipe it is the juice of one orange, but i think this would be too much. i had the problem that my filling turned into one sticky ball and a lot of liquid around after adding the orange juice. so you have to try it out a bit. chop the chocolate and combine with the other ingredients. divide the filling in four equal parts.

melt the remaining butter. place the first filo pastry sheet on a kitchen towel, brush with some melted butter and put the next sheet on top. repeat twice, so you have four pastry layers. cut the pastry to an appropriate size. jamie suggests 20 cm by 20 cm but it depends again a bit on the size of your pears. it has to be big enough to fold over on the top of the pear, just as you can see on the picture.

stuff the first pear with one part of the filling. all the filling that does not fit in the hole you made just pour on the first pastry piece and set the stuffed pear on top. now fold over the pastry leaves so that only the stalk will look out. press on that part where the pastry shall stick together and set on a baking tray.

repeat for the other three pears and bake them until they become golden for about 30 minutes.

i served the baked pears with some fromage frais. it´s freshness harmonized  perfectly with the still warm pears and the melted chocolate. you can also try crème fraîche or vanilla ice cream.

enjoy!