A minimalist but delicious vegan pear and almond tart with a whole wheat crust and amaretto-spiked pears.
You might also like this recipe for vegan pear bread.
It's late Thanksgiving morning, those special someones are coming over for dinner, and you've been slaving over a delicious vegan meal from the moment you got home yesterday afternoon. Everything looks amazing, but you still want to kick yourself. Because you forgot dessert.
Well maybe you're different, but that often happens to me. I usually leave dessert for the very end in my meal planning because there's always the possibility of making it optional. Or serving up some fresh fruit. All well and good, except, honestly, you simply cannot do that on Thanksgiving.
No, Thanksgiving is the day for stuffing yourself and your guests without any excuses, and even if you've just served up a meal everyone will remember a year after, there is no way you can wriggle out of serving up a slice of pie.
Well, this Pear and Almond Tart is the perfect recipe for a day so special. It's easy as pie to make, looks perfectly elegant, and is incredibly delicious with the warmth of nutmeg-kissed pears in a biscuity, almondy, part whole-wheat crust.
I add some Amaretto, an almond liqueur, to add more almond flavor to this tart, but if you would rather not, use a little almond extract instead. You could also try mixing some slivered almonds in with the filling-- they'd be perfect in here.
Enjoy the recipe, all!
More vegan pie recipes
Recipe card
Vegan Pear and Almond Tart
Ingredients
For the crust
- ½ cup whole wheat pastry flour
- ¾ cup all purpose flour
- ¼ cup almond butter
- ¼ cup vegan butter
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- Ice-cold water
For the filling
- 3 pears , cut into halves, then thinly sliced horizontally (there's no need to peel them-- the skins melt in the mouth when baked)
- ¼ cup sugar
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg (use cardamom for a delicious variation)
- 1 tablespoon amaretto (almond liqueur). Use ½ teaspoon almond extract if you'd rather not use the liqueur.
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 2 tablespoon all purpose flour
Instructions
- Toss the pears and other ingredients together gently (the pears will break easily, so be careful)
- Set aside for 15 minutes
- Mix the two flours, salt and sugar in a bowl and then, using a pastry cutter or two forks, cut in the almond butter and vegan butter until they are evenly dispersed through the flour. The shortening should be in little pieces, about the size of peas.
- Using a fork to mix the flour, drizzle in the ice cold water, a tablespoon at a time, until the dough comes together in a ball.
- Place the dough in plastic wrap, shape into a disk, wrap tightly, and place in the refrigerator for three hours or overnight. You can even make this a few days ahead and freeze it, then thaw it ovenight in the refrigerator. Remember to keep the dough cold at all times.
Assemble the tart
- Take the refrigerated dough and, on a floured surface, roll it into a disc about 12 inches in diameter (most tart pans are 10 inches in diameter, and you want to give another inch or so to cover the sides. When rolling any pie dough keep rotating the dough and flouring the surface and rolling pin to ensure it is not sticking to the surface.
- Fold the disc in half, then lift it into the tart pan. Open it to cover the tart pan. Very gently, with your fingers, push the dough into the corners so that the dough fits evenly into the tart pan. Use a rolling pin to roll over the edges of the tart pan and cut off the excess dough.
- Refrigerate the tart pan with the dough inside for 10 minutes.
- Working quickly, arrange the pear slices in the pan in concentric circles, overlapping them. You can try any design you like, or even go free-form, but this simple design I made is an easy one and doesn't take any time at all. If you have broken pear pieces, put them at the bottom and use the good ones on top.
- Pour any juice at the bottom of the bowl into the tart pan.
- Place on a baking sheet and bake 55-60 minutes in a preheated 375-degree oven. The filling will be mostly set but might appear slightly jiggly in parts, which is okay.
- Cool thoroughly on a rack before serving, which gives the filling time to thicken and solidify.
Nutrition Information
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Claude says
Hi Vaishali. Wow this pear tart was absolutely delicious! I am not a baker but after sampling some amazing ( not vegan) pear tarts in France recently, I decided to give your vegan tart recipe a go. I am one of those cooks that cant seem to follow a recipe so I modified according to what was available and it still worked!!
I didn't have almond butter so used almond power, a bit more vegan butter, plus a tablespoon of natural peanut butter ( sort of like almond butter right?). Then I certainly didn't have enough sugar but I did have maple syrup! Finally no amaretto so I used Cointreau instead. I served this at a meeting this morning and almost all had seconds!!. Thank you so much for sharing! Apparently I can bake now.