Poached pear, Calvados and spices
Preparation time : 20 mn
Cooking time : 1 h
Serves 4
Ingredients
2 pears
Syrup:
1 l of water
300 g of white sugar
Star anise, cinnamon and cardamom
5 cl of Calvados
Buckwheat shortbread :
soft butter
caster sugar
1 g of salt
4 g of yeast
25 g of egg yolk
40 g flour t55
30 g buckwheat flour
Pears
Mix water and sugar with star anise, cinnamon and cardamom in a saucepan.
Peel the pears.
Add Calvados to the syrup.
Poach the pears in the syrup for 40 minutes.
Place a sheet of parchment paper of the same diameter on the pan.
Reduce the syrup of the pears (only one part and keep the rest to poach other pears, to flavour a water or a fruit salad)
Biscuit
Make a soft butter. Mix with sugar. Mix with the eggs. Add flour and yeast.
Spread thinly on a baking sheet of parchment paper.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes at 180°C (356°F)
Whipped cream
Whip the cream
Add powdered sugar and two spoons of Calvados
Mix it all together
“This recipe is like a candy to be enjoyed by the fireplace.”
What is a Trou Normand?
In the 19th century, the “Trou Normand” had an official place at mealtimes, it was a small glass of Calvados served to aid digestion during banquets and formal meals. Gustave Flaubert alludes to this widespread custom in his “Bouvard et Pécuchet” written in 1881. Tradition has it that, midway through the meal, the master of the house invited his guests to raise their half-filled glass of Calvados, smell it and then swallow it down in one gulp. Today, the tradition is to serve an apple sorbet soaked in Calvados in the middle of the meal.
