Imagine a delicious homemade pear pie, laced with a flakey buttery crust and a juicy, cinnamon and nutmeg infused fresh pear pie filling. It is the stuff dessert dreams are made of.
6cupsthinly sliced pearspeeled, about 6-7 medium-size pears
¾cupsugar
2tablespoonall-purpose flour
¾teaspoonground cinnamon
¼teaspoonkosher salt
⅛teaspoonground nutmeg
1tablespoonfresh lemon juice
1pkgrefrigerated pie crustsYou need two crusts
Instructions
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
Place one crust in an ungreased 9-inch glass pie plate. Smooth out when your fingers so that it covers the bottom and sides of the dish.
Add the pears, sugar, flour, cinnamon, salt, lemon juice, and nutmeg to a large bowl. Gently stir all ingredients until they are thoroughly mixed. Pour into the prepared pie crust. Spread the filling out evenly.
Top with the second crust. Gently fold the excess top crust over and under the sides of the bottom crust and press edges together to seal. You should have an even double roll of pie crust around the top.
To flute, the pie crust, use one finger to push the inner edge out while pinching the outer edge in with the thumb and index finger of the other hand. Repeat around the entire edge of the pie. Alternatively, you can take a fork and press the tines around the entire edge of the pie to seal the crust.
Cut several slits in the top crust.
Bake for 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and place strips of aluminum foil around the pie crust edge to keep it from browning too fast. Bake for another 20-25 minutes. Cool on a wire rack for at least two hours before serving.
Notes
Sharon's Expert Tips:
This recipe is best when made with hard or firm slightly underripe pears.
Do not make the pie filling ahead of time. The pears will turn brown and will give off too much juice, which will result in a soggy crust.
You can use a frozen unbaked deep-dish pie shell if you do not want a top crust. If you do, you can top the pears with a streusel mixture consisting of ⅓ cup flour, ⅓ cup brown sugar, and 3 tablespoons cold butter. Mix the streusel ingredients with a fork and sprinkle evenly over the top of the pears — bake as directed.
Instead of using aluminum foil to keep your crust from burning, pie crust shields can be purchased, which you can reuse.
This recipe calls for a 9-inch pie plate and all I had was a dish that measured 9.5 inches at the top. Because of this, my bottom crust wasn't large enough to extend past the edge of the dish. Consequently, I didn't have enough overlap to produce a pretty fluted edge. Of course, the pie still tasted the same, but the crust edges weren't as pretty as they could have been.