There are many ways to make tarte tatin, and my team and I tried a lot of them! After several recipe fails, we finally cracked the code on how to make a deliciously spiced pear tarte tatin that turns out consistently every time. It may not be the way they teach it in French pastry school, but our goal was to take a somewhat-daunting recipe and make it approachable and achievable for home/hobby bakers. That is always my goal when I teach you.
What Is Tarte Tatin?
Tarte tatin is named for the Tatin sisters who created it and served it at their hotel in France in the 1880s. It’s essentially fruit, usually apples or pears, caramelized in butter and sugar on the stove, topped with a round of pastry dough and baked; to serve, the dessert is inverted onto a plate so the caramelized fruit is on top and the pastry becomes a crust beneath it. Sort of like an apple upside down cake, but more saucy and made with pastry instead of cake. Pretty simple, oui? Mais, non. 😉 Perfecting pear tarte tatin, which only has about 8 ingredients, proved to be a much bigger challenge than my team or I expected.
Start With a Quality Pastry Crust
This is actually the same dough we use to make apple galette. Many tarte tatin recipes call for puff pastry, but we had much better success with this crust vs. the puff pastry dough we tested at first. See recipe testing saga above! My team and I tried puff pastry (both homemade rough puff pastry and store-bought), which is what many tarte tatin recipes call for, but we had much better success with pie dough. The puff pastry was not cooking through properly; leaving layers basically raw. If we extended the bake time, the fruit would burn. Pie dough was flaky and perfectly cooked through. Delicious!
We tried caramelizing the pears on the stove, which is a step in most tarte tatin recipes. However, this over-cooked the pears. It also encouraged the pears to release more liquid in the caramel sauce before it hit the oven, which caused the caramel to burn and taste bitter. So, skip pre-cooking the pears as the recipe instructs below. Less work! We also tried cutting the pears into smaller slices. Again, the pears over-cooked. Pear halves cook into a tender, but not mushy, consistency.
And finally, in one of the last test recipes before completely giving up, we switched from white granulated sugar in the topping to brown sugar. We had MUCH more consistent success when using brown sugar. The caramel didn’t burn at any point in the recipe process, it thickened wonderfully, and the brown sugar also added a little more flavor. Phew! I think that was it. Get ready for tarte tatin success.
This is a similar recipe to my all-butter pie crust, but it’s slightly sweeter and yields just 1 crust instead of 2. (But feel free to make the full pie crust recipe and use half for another single-crust pie like pumpkin pie, or freeze half for a future tarte tatin!) I love how thick this crust is… think multiple flaky, buttery layers of crust for the sweet caramelized pears to nestle into. And it bakes through thoroughly, so no soggy crust situation here.
Ingredients You Need:
Pears: You need about 5–6 small, semi-firm pears. See below for information on the best varieties of pears to use. Lemon or Orange Juice: A little fresh citrus juice brightens up and enhances the natural flavor of the pears; the fruit tastes a bit flat without it. Spices: Cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger. Just enough of each to provide a warm flavor that complements—not overwhelms—the caramelized pears. Butter: One half of the caramel sauce. Brown Sugar: The other half of the caramel sauce.
Best Pears to Use in Tarte Tatin
Use small, somewhat-firm anjou pears. Bartlett, Bosc, or Comice pears are all wonderful choices, too. But you want to use pears that are small and still fairly firm so they’ll hold their shape when baking. Some recipes instruct you to dry out the pears before using, to help prevent them from releasing too much liquid. I did not find that necessary, especially since we aren’t pre-cooking the pears on the stove and we’re using a thicker brown sugar caramel sauce. Peel, slice lengthwise, cut out the stem, and scoop out the core. I use a small cookie scoop for this, but you can use a melon baller if you have one, or carefully cut out the core with a knife. Toss the pears with the lemon juice and spices.
Cook the Caramel on the Stove
Many recipes call for caramelizing the pears on the stove first, but we found this step unnecessary (and ended up with several ruined batches of burnt pears). Instead, you’ll cook the butter and brown sugar together, and then take it off heat before adding the pears. I use a 10-inch cast-iron skillet for this, but if you don’t have an oven-safe skillet, you can cook the caramel in a saucepan, and then pour the caramel into a pie dish.
Assemble the Pear Tarte Tatin
Arrange your pears over the hot caramel in the pan, core-side-up. You want to pack them in as tightly as possible. Once the tart is inverted after baking, you’ll be rewarded with a beautiful landscape of caramelized pear halves over top of the crust. Roll out the pie dough and drape it over the pears. Don’t worry if the pie dough isn’t perfect; it will taste divine! There’s no crimping or fluting required, and you don’t even need an egg wash. Use a spoon to gently tuck the edges in around the pears. Dock the crust with a fork to create some steam vents. Bake, starting at a higher temperature at first to really begin browning and baking through the crust. Let cool for about 10 minutes, and then very carefully (do it over the sink!) invert the warm tart onto a large (larger than the skillet) plate or serving platter. Voila! And, for a little extra ooh la la, serving this spiced pear tarte tatin a la mode with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream is always a great idea. Bon appetit! This recipe is part of Sally’s Pie Week, an annual tradition where I share a handful of new recipes that fit into the pie/crisp/tart category. Join the community below!
