Pear and Chocolate and Almond Tart

During our Christmas celebrations, we made and ate a lot of pies, and this one really stood out and was a clear favorite with most of us. It is based on this recipe from the New York Times. I made it again for a work party, and conveniently remembered to take pictures also. This time I made it in a 9" springform pan because my pie dish was already occupied, so the crust is a little wonky, but that certainly didn't affect the flavor .

Chocolate Pear Almond Tart
3-4 pears, ripe but firm
juice of 1 lemon
3/4 cup sugar, divided
4 oz bittersweet chocolate
3 Tbsp butter, softened
2 eggs
1/2 cup almond flour
7 or 8 oz package almond paste or marzipan
1 pie crust, par baked (we used this sour cream pie crust - so easy)
Preheat oven to 350.

Prepare the Pears:
Peel, halve and core the pears, place in a saucepan, and cover with cold water, add the lemon juice and 1/2 cup of the sugar. Heat on medium to a simmer, let cook for 7-10 minutes, until the pears are just getting a little softer. You don't want them very soft because they will bake some more with the whole pie. Drain well.

While the pears are cooking, prepare the Chocolate Filling:
Melt the chocolate, add the softened butter 1 tablespoon at a time. Add the eggs 1 at a time, then stir in remaining 1/4 cup of sugar and the almond flour.

Assemble:
Roll out the almond paste to a circle the size of the inside of your pie crust, place on the bottom of the crust. Spread the chocolate filling on top. Slice the pear halves into long quarters (each slice should be about 1/8 of a pear) and arrange on top of the chocolate in a nice pattern. The 3 times we made this, we only ended up using about 2 1/2 pears total.

Bake for 30 minutes, the chocolate filling should get a little puffy and look dry on the outside.

Serve warm or cold, whipped cream makes it even better. Try to get a second piece before it's all gone. Make it again tomorrow.

Getting Ready for Pi Day with Crustless Apple Pies

Tomorrow is Pi Day (3.14...  --> 3/14) and it's such a great excuse to make and eat pie, since pi is about circles, and pie is in the shape of a circle, it's only appropriate. (Although I guess there are other treats shaped like circles, but it's not the same. And apparently January 23rd is always National Pie Day, but we always forget about that one.) So, I'm really excited, we should have a lot of pies tomorrow at the office. (I LOVE my work.)

I'm planning to make apple and rhubarb tarte tatin (which I've wanted to try for a long time) based on this recipe, and I kind of want to try a buttermilk pie, because I have buttermilk in the fridge, and maybe I would add orange zest to it. That sounds good, right? I have my pie crusts made, and I did them differently this time, using this recipe, except I used buttermilk instead of sour cream, because of all the buttermilk in the fridge, so we'll see how that turns out. (Don't worry, I did some research, and there is such a thing as buttermilk pie crust, so it should be fine.)

And tonight, to get ready and share the joy of pi(e), I made these Crustless Apple Pies (because these are circles, too). I changed it up a little, we were feeding a gluten-free person, so no flour and no oats because oats are often processed in the same facilities as flour, and are often contaminated with gluten.

Mini Crustless Apple Pies (I'm calling them mini because the apples were pretty small)

6 granny smith apples, cut in half and cored (or any good type of baking apple)
handful of dried pitted dates
honey (sorry, I didn't measure it, maybe 1/8 cup, possibly even less, honey is super sweet)
1 tsp tapioca flour (you could use cornstarch or flour, but if you can get tapioca flour I recommend it, I use tapioca for thickening all my fruit pies now)
1 tsp cinnamon
pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
pinch of cardamom
zest of 1 lemon
juice of 1 lemon
about 1/2 - 3/4 cup sweetened shredded coconut
2 Tbsp butter, melted

Scoop out the innards of the apple halves with a melon baller - I never would have thought a melon baller would work so well on apples, but it's perfect, it's also just the right size for coring the apple halves - leaving about 1/3" of flesh inside of the peel, set aside the scooped out innards, treat the apple shells and pieces with lemon juice to keep them from browning while you work (I didn't have enough lemon juice so I filled up a bowl with cold water and a little white vinegar and let the cut up apples hang out in it).

Soak the dates in boiling hot water for a few minutes to let them get soft, cut into smallish pieces.

Mix together apple-innard pieces (you might want to cut these a little smaller than melon-baller size) and soaked dates, pour on some honey until it looks good (taste a piece of apple to see if its at a good sweetness level), add the tapioca flour, spices, lemon zest and lemon juice, stir it all together.

Place the hollowed out apple halves on a baking sheet, stuff this delightful mixture into each shell, dividing equally between all of them, it should be a little mounded up, but not overfull in each.

Mix together the sweetened coconut and melted butter (I whizzed the coconut through my spice blender for a few seconds to get it into finer pieces, I don't love the texture of it in long shreds), and divide out spoonfuls on top of each apple half.

Bake at 375 for about 40 minutes, the juices will be going all over, and the coconut topping will be crisp, and the apples shells will be getting soft , but not collapsing. Let cool a little and serve, maybe with ice cream or whipped cream.

Best Pumpkin Pie

Ellen says it's the best she's had, and pumpkin is her favorite kind of pie. It is based on the recipe on the back of the Libby's can of pumpkin, adjusted for what we had at home and other recipe ideas that we saw around the interwebs and recipe books at home. You can always play with spice amounts and combinations; I usually figure that you can add more spices to almost anything that it calls for in the recipe. I didn't take any pictures, but you can imagine what it looks like because it pretty much looked like any other pumpkin pie.

Best Pumpkin Pie 
1 single unbaked pie crust
filling:
1 15 oz can pumpkin puree
1 12 oz can sweetened condensed milk
3 eggs
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 450 F.

Place crust in a pie pan, fold under the edges and crimp. Keep crust cold in the fridge or freezer until until ready to bake pie

Mix together all filling ingredients thoroughly.

Pour filling into pie shell, bake at 450 for 10 minutes, decrease temperature to 350 for an additional 50 minutes, more or less. I could tell it was done but not overdone because the filling still jiggled a little bit, but didn't look at all liquid, it was puffy and developing smallish cracks on the sides next to the crust, and the bottom of the crust was a lovely golden brown as well as the exposed edges.

Let cool completely in the refrigerator before serving with freshly whipped cream. Store remainders in refrigerator if you have any.

Thanksgiving: Pies

We made lots of pies for Thanksgiving, which was fun because there weren't very many of us, just Older Brother, Lovemuffin, and me, and we shared with everyone we could, but we still had lots leftover to eat for breakfast and lunch and dinner the whole weekend. I hope you have noticed the new link I put in my sidebar, my visiting teacher has a blog devoted to desserts and it is lovely. I used two recipes from her blog, which was wonderful because she had them up before Thanksgiving, unlike me. But on a positive note, my crusts were excellent (not bragging, just a fact). I doubled my recipe, used a lower proportion of whole wheat flour, and ended up with enough for 5 single-crust pies with a little left over.

One pie was a pecan and chocolate delight that we brought to someone else's house so that we wouldn't eat the whole thing. I had about 3 bites altogether and kind of regretted sharing so much.

Pecan Chocolate Pie

The second was cranberry cream pie. I made three of these in three days so that we could share and still have plenty of our own. I had a hard time getting this one to set up as much as it is in her picture. It was pretty soupy until it was completely chilled. And you know we were eating it before it was completely chilled. This soupiness I attribute to the fact that the cranberries were frozen before I made it, so when I rinsed them off probably some water stayed frozen on them and messed up the balance of liquid to thickener. I think I will keep experimenting with this one, maybe try instant tapioca as a thickener as well as not frozen berries. And I think it would be lovely with some other fruits too, so you might see this come up again.

Cranberry and Cream Pie

The other pie I made was pumpkin and coconut, which I thought would be great after my pumpkin/coconut cake experiment. And it was mediocre. I more or less followed the recipe on the back of the Libby's canned pumpkin, but replaced the evaporated milk with coconut milk, added extra spices including cardamom, and added about 3/4 cup of shredded coconut chopped more finely in my spice grinder. The recipe looks very much like this one, but without the Trader Joe's spice blend. Maybe Trader Joe's spice blend would have improved it. Well, it was better on the second and third day, and the coconut milk is a good way to make it lactose-free in case you have one of those that you need to accommodate (hi Dad!). But the coconut flavor was not pronounced enough, and I thought the shredded coconut would be an improvement on the texture of pumpkin pie, but it wasn't. Pumpkin pie isn't my favorite in the best of times, but it was pretty disappointing to have it so unimproved.

Pumpkin Coconut Pie

Older Brother said that someone he knows was telling him about their family, who on Thanksgiving morning all get together and eat pie for breakfast and then of course the regular meal later. I think that sounds  like a great idea and I will probably implement it next year. Or maybe tomorrow. What is your favorite kind of pie for Thanksgiving? Do you have any special pie traditions?

Apple Harvest Phase 1

I had high hopes of preserving a lot of apples yesterday, but I first had to learn if fuji apples would make a good pie. After reading here that they are good for eating fresh and good for a sauce that needs no sugar added, I wasn't sure if making ready-to-bake frozen pies would be a good idea. So I whipped up an apple crisp for breakfast that turned out okay. The apples didn't fall apart or shrink too much, so I was assured that they would bake well in a pie, and there are now two rustic tarts now residing in the freezer.

I like to make this kind of pie because it's easy and quicker than assembling a regular 2-crust pie and you can usually get two almost whole pies out of it instead of just one. There was some leftover pie filling, and this morning it was simmered on the stove and used as a topping for French toast. It was really sweet, so I can certainly be sure that the applesauce I (hope to) make today will not need any extra sugar at all. I am a tiny bit concerned that the pies will be too sweet . . . . . but they'll still get eaten.

Peach and Ginger!

I finally got some great looking peaches and fresh ginger root and combined them in a pie, like I've been wanting to do for a long time. It was fabulous! I cannot describe just how much I liked it, so instead I'll give you the recipe and you'll have to try it, too. I hope you like it as much as I do. Sorry, no pictures this time.

Sensational Peach and Ginger Rustic Pie
4 large peaches
juice of one small lemon
1/2 inch chunk fresh ginnger
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1/3 c. sugar
2 tsp. cornstarch

chilled pie crust dough for a 1 crust pie

Poach the peaches in boiling water for a minute, then dunk in ice water, now the peels should slide off easily. Peel the peaches, cut into 8 pieces and place in a bowl with the lemon juice. Cut the ginger into pieces small enough to fit in a garlic mincer, mince it into the peach bowl. Mix the ground ginger with the sugar and mix with the peaches. Let set for at least 15 minutes, drain any accumulated juices into a small saucepan. Bring the juices to a boil, swirling them gently until they have reduced and carmelized somewhat. Meanwhile, gently mix the cornstarch through the peaches, making sure there are no clumps. Pour the reduced juices back over the peaches and mix again.
Now to assemble the pie: place the chilled pie crust dough on a lightly greased baking sheet. Arrange the peach slices in the middle of the crust, and fold the edge over so that there is about 2 inches of crust over the filling, and a you can see the filling in the middle. Seal the folds well so that the crust won't relax and fall apart as it bakes. Pour the juices into the middle of the pie. Chill the pie in the fridge while the oven preheats to 450, at least 30 minutes. If desired, you can brush the crust with milk and sprinkle lightly with sugar before baking, to make a shiny and sparkly crust. Bake for about 25 minutes, or until the filling is bubbly and the crust is quite brown. Let the pie cool for at least 30 minutes, then cut into wedges and serve.

Shaker Lemon Pie

A cousin of the Lovemuffin has a lemon tree in her backyard that produces vigorously. We've been going there to help with some things around the house, and each time we do, we take a bunch of lemons with us. The last time we went home with two bags of lemons, so I decided to make a Shaker Lemon Pie. I made this kind of pie once last year, using a recipe from "The Pie and Pastry Bible" and the Lovemuffin thought it was the best thing ever. I thought it was kind of weird and too bitter-lemony. So this time I found a different way of preparing the lemons from another recipe on epicurious.com and I liked it much more. It was less bitter, but still overpoweringly lemony and very refreshing and delightful. It is great with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream, but it is best all by itself.

Shaker Lemon Pie

Prepared crust dough for a 2-crust pie (I use my whole wheat pie crust recipe)

2 large lemons

2 c. sugar

4 eggs

1 egg yolk

The day before you want to serve the pie, begin preparing the lemons. Start boiling some water in a medium saucepan, enough to cover the lemons. Wash the lemons, scrubbing the skins gently, especially if your lemons are not organic and may have been treated with pesticides or wax. Once the water comes to a boil, drop the lemons in and let them poach for 30 seconds. Drain and cool the lemons. When they are cool enough to handle, cut the ends off, just to the point you can see the sections underneath the pith. Discard the ends. Cut lemons in half lengthwise, and then cut each half into very thin slices, as thin as you can manage. Discard the seeds, and place the slices and any accumulated juice in a medium bowl. Add the sugar and stir it through the slices gently. Stir the mixture again after 1 hour, try to get keep the rinds under the syrupas much as possible. Let the mixture soak for at least 8 hours, but preferably closer to 24.

Roll out the pie crusts using the method described in my recipe. Place one pie crust in the bottom of a 9-inch glass pie dish. Cover with plastic wrap and chill in the freezer for about 10 minutes. Keep the other crust chilled in the fridge. When the crust is sufficiently chilled, take it out and take off the plastic. Take the lemon slices out of the syrup, letting the syrup drip off back into the bowl, and place them in an even layer in the bottom crust. Add the eggs and yolk to the syrup and mix well; then pour the syrup and eggs over the lemon slices. Trim the edge of the crust to overhang the pie dish by 1/2 inch. Place the second crust on top, press the top and bottom crusts together gently, to keep the top one from shifting. Trim the top crust to overhang the edge of the pie dish by 1 inch. Fold the top crust under the bottom and crimp them together, using whatever crimping method you prefer, only make sure that it is well sealed.

Cover the pie with plastic wrap and place it in the freezer for 30 minutes while you preheat the oven to 425 F. When the oven is hot, take the pie out of the freezer, remove the plastic wrap and cut some fairly wide slits in the top crust. Put the pie on the bottom shelf of the oven and bake for 25 minutes. Turn the oven down to 325 F, and bake for 25-30 more minutes. If the top and edges of the crust are getting brown too fast, you can cover it with a ring of foil. When the pie is done, you will hear the filling bubbling gently, and you can see on the bottom side of the pan that the bottom crust is nice and brown. Let the pie cool completely before slicing to let the filling set up completely. You can put it in a well-ventilated spot in the fridge to speed up the process.

Now slice and enjoy!

Pie Crust Dough

Here is my fool proof way of making flaky, delicious pie crust without a food processor or any other nifty gadgets. A lot of the technique described here I learned from Berenbaum's "The Pie and Pastry Bible" as well as her blog, and if you want to learn more about the science of making pie, I would definitely recommend that you look through that book.

For my pie crust, I like to use a combination of all-purpose and whole wheat flours because the bran in the whole wheat helps break up gluten strands, which will help keep the overall product tender. If you want to do it with all white flour, try to buy pastry flour, it has less gluten and you will have a good outcome either way. I also like using the whole wheat because then I can say that the pie is practically a health food. Please feel free to play around with the proportions of wheat/white flour, you may want to use a little less wheat flour than called for in this recipe. It is on the verge of being too grainy and not delicate enough for a pastry. Also, I prefer using all butter, mostly because I don't think shortening is fit for human consumption. But if you think it is easier to work with some shortening, I think about half butter, half shortening is a good ratio. The techniques described below are made for an all butter crust. I add a titch of baking powder just for a little extra boost of rising power, but it is optional. If you keep the dough very cold the whole time you are making it, you should get enough rise just from the butter melting and creating steam. This recipe makes enough dough for a two-crust 9-inch pie. It can even do a deep dish pie if you need too. And if you have any leftovers they can be frozen and then re-rolled and made into pie crust cookies, or even used for mini-tartlets or turnovers or for patching a whole other pie crust if you should run out of dough.

Whole Wheat Pie Crust Dough
1 c. unsalted butter (2 cubes)
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 c. whole wheat flour (I prefer soft white wheat flour, but any kind will do)
1/2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. baking powder, preferably aluminum free (like Rumford brand)
6-8 Tbsp. ice cold water

Cut the butter into 1/2-inch cubes, and place in the freezer while you prepare to other ingredients. Mix together the flours, salt and baking powder in a large bowl. When the butter is well chilled and very hard, toss it in the flour and coat the cubes with flour. With your fingers, very quickly rub the butter into the flour. Smear it between your thumb and fingers to make sheets. If your fingers start to feel greasy like the butter is melting too much, put the bowl in the freezer for a couple of minutes. When the butter has been worked into the flour to the point that it resembles small peas, take the ice water and sprinkle 1 tablespoon at a time over the cold flour/butter mixture. Toss the mixture gently after every 2 tablespoons. A good way to tell if you have enough water is if you can take a pinch of the gently mixed dough and if it mostly holds together after you pinch it, it has enough water and is ready to knead.

Dump out the whole mixture onto a nice clean countertop that you can knead it on. To knead, take a handful at a time and smear it across the surface. This will form the butter into thin sheets and the water will get worked into the dough, but it won't develop the gluten too much. Do the smearing quickly so that the heat from your hands does not melt the butter. Gather up the smeared stuff, you can use a knife or a scraper to get up anything sticking to the surface. Repeat the technique until all of the dough has been smeared once, then gather it up and kind of pat it together and if it's still very crumbly, repeat the smearing/kneading once more very quickly with bigger handfuls. It will still be a little crumbly, but don't worry about it too much. You should still be able to see large bits of butter throughout the kneaded dough; it won't be completely homogenous. Divide the dough into two mostly equal-sized pieces. Form the two halves of the dough into discs, wrap in plastic wrap and roll the edges so that they are smooth instead of jagged. This will be beneficial when rolling them out. Place in the fridge for at least one hour. I like to prepare the dough one day ahead of time and let it chill overnight.

When the dough is chilled and you have time to devote to rolling, take one disc out at a time and roll it between sheets of plastic wrap. I use 4 sheets altogether to make 2 large squares, with 2 pieces on each side. I have also tried using waxed paper for this part, but I recommend the plastic wrap because it will be sticky on the table; waxed paper is too slippery. Roll out one disc until it is about 1/8 inch thick. Remember how we rolled the edges of the discs before rolling out the dough? That keeps the edges of the circles from becoming too jagged so that you don't have to patch them as much. Stop rolling whenever it starts getting too easy, or if you start seeing or feeling greasiness, and put the whole thing in the freezer for a couple of minutes. You can switch off from one half to the other while the first one chills. Remember that the more diligent you are about keeping the dough cold, the flakier the crust will be. The plastic wrap is good for this job because then the crust is easy to pick up and chill, it doesn't stick to the table or the plastic. When you are ready, follow your pie recipe's instructions for constructing the pie.

A few other notes about making the best pie crust possible: To keep the pie crust from shrinking while baking, be sure to not stretch it as you are placing it in the pan or on top of the filling. Also, if you chill the entire pie in the freezer for at least 30 minutes before baking, the crust will be less likely to shrink. I like to use a glass pie dish, because then I can look at the bottom crust and when it is brown, the pie is probably done. I was nervous at first about putting a glass pan straight from the freezer into the oven, but I've done it now several times and haven't had a problem yet. However, if you would like to use a metal pan, try to use a dark, dull metal, not shiny.

Peach Pie for a Friend

This is for you, It's About The Story, I saw your comment and I will tell you how to make the peach pie, but I didn't measure things. But you can still go get some of those Brigham City peaches and make something awesome!

Peach Pie
Prepare enough pie crust dough for a 9-inch deep dish pie crust. Roll out the two crusts between sheets of plastic wrap. Keep them well-chilled while rolling by placing them in the freezer for a couple of minutes if the butter starts to melt. Place a bottom crust in a 9-inch deep dish pie pan, and place in the freezer to chill for at least 30 minutes, or until the filling is ready. Keep the rolled second crust in between the plastic wrap and chill in the freezer until the filling is ready.

To prepare the filling: Take about 8 peaches, and poach them, 2 or 3 at a time, in boiling water for about 30 seconds each, then immediately place in cold water. This will help the peels come off. When they are all poached and in the cold water, start slipping the skins off, they should come off pretty easily, but if they don't, just peel them with a knife. Cut the flesh into slices, not too thin, maybe 6-8 slices/peach. Place the slices in a nice big bowl, and sprinkle the juice of one lemon over them. Then sprinkle about 1/2 cup of sugar over them and the spices of your choice. Spices are optional, actually. I think peaches can really stand on their own. But I did about 2 tsp. cinnamon and 1 tsp. ginger, and I couldn't even taste the ginger. So if I was going to go for a peach ginger pie, the way I want to sometime, I would add only ginger, and I would probably use either fresh minced or crystalized ginger. Anyway, stir the sugar and spices through the peaches, and let it sit. It will become juicy and soupy as the sugar pulls fluid out of the peaches. After about 30 minutes, drain as much as you can of the juicy stuff into a small saucepan. Bring the juice to a boil, turn the heat down and let simmer gently. Swirl the pan occasionally to keep it from burning. The juices should become darker and reduce quite a bit. While it is simmering, measure about 1 Tbsp of cornstarch into the peaches and gently mix it in to make sure that there are no clumps and it is well distributed. When the juice has reduced by at least 1/3, take it off the heat and pour over the peaches and stir it in gently.

Now assemble the pie: Take the crusts out of the freezer a few minutes before assembly so that they can warm up enough to not break when you try to work with them. Pour the filling into the bottom crust. Trim the bottom crust to have a 1/2 inch overhang over the edge of the pan. Gently place the top crust on top and press the two together slightly to keep the top from shifting. Trim the top crust to a 1 inch overhang. Now fold the top underneath the bottom, and crimp the edges to seal the two crusts tightly together. Cut slits in the top, make them wide enough that when the juices bubble up they won't seal the slits closed.

Cover the pie with plastic wrap and stick it back in the freezer again. At this point you can leave it in the freezer for a while, even for weeks if you've wrapped it really well. About 30 minutes before you want to bake it, begin preheating the oven to 450 degrees F. When the oven is preheated, take the pie out of the freezer and take off the plastic. Place the pie on the bottom rack of the oven, and bake for about 50 minutes. You should be able to hear the filling bubbling, and the crust should be dark brown. You will probably want to cover the edges of the crust after 30 minutes of baking to make sure they don't burn. If it looks like the top crust is getting too brown, you can cover the whole thing with a large foil tent. Cut nice big vents in it to let the steam out or the crust will get soggy. If you are nervous about putting a pie pan in the oven right after it has been in the freezer, you can use metal pans and they will do just fine, but it should be dark, dull metal, not shiny. And DO NOT use those cheap throw-away ones that come in packs of three. They cannot support a whole pie if you only holding the rim of the pan. But consider this, I have used good quality glass pans at least 5 times and moved a whole pie straight from the freezer to the hot oven and the pans have never broken from the extreme temperature change. I like using glass because then the bottom of the bottom crust can get brown and you can see it through the glass. That is actually the best way to tell if your pie is baked all the way.

Okay, so your pie crust is nice and brown, but not burnt, you can hear the filling bubbling away, and hopefully you can see that the bottom of the pie is nice and brown as well. So take it out of the oven and let it cool for at least 1 hour to let all the juices set up and thicken a little. It doesn't have to be cooled off all the way. Now cut it and eat it up!

Pear and Chocolate Tartlets

Last weekend in Italy we found some pear and chocolate pastries, which we just had to get for breakfast because pear and chocolate is one of my favorite unlikely flavor combinations. These pastries had bits of pear inside with chocolate melted all over it, all wrapped up in puff pastry and dusted on the top with powdered sugar mixed with cocoa powder. It was pretty good, but there was (you may not think this is possible...) too much chocolate and it overwhelmed the taste of the pears. I decided to make my own pear and chocolate tartlets to see if I could do as good or better, and this is what I came up with. It is super easy to prepare the elements days ahead of time, then bake when needed. you could even bake just two at a time. It would be simple to increase the amount or vary the size or shape of the tartlets as desired.

Pear and Chocolate Tartlets

Pie crust dough (enough to make a 1 crust 9-inch pie)

3 pears, not too ripe

milk for brushing on pastry crust

granulated sugar, to taste

about 1/2 chocolate sauce recipe

Roll out pie crust dough into a large rectangle, about 1/8 inch thick. Keep the dough chilled for maximum flakiness. Cut dough into 6 rectangles, each about 5 x 3.5 inches, depending on how large your pears are. Use any excess dough for pie-crust cookies. Place rectangles on a lightly greased baking sheet, and score part of the way through pastry dough with a knife 1/2 inch inside of the edge. Brush a little milk onto each rectangle. Peel the pears, core and cut into 1/2 inch slices (10-12 slices/pear), cover generously with lemon juice to keep them from browning. Place slices of pears on the rectangles of dough, one half of each pear on each rectangle, keeping the pieces within the score marks. Sprinkle a little sugar on each tartlet, only about 1/2 teaspoon on each. Immediately place the baking sheet in the preheated oven at 400 F. Bake for about 20 minutes, till the edges and bottoms of the crusts are brown, and the juices have coagulated. Remove from baking sheet and let cool for at least one hour. Scoop chocolate sauce into a piping bag (or a sandwich bag with a hole in a corner to squeeze through). Squeeze a drizzle of chocolate sauce on top of the tartlets, not too much. Enjoy!