Pear and ricotta tart without butter, with a delicious olive oil shortcrust pastry without leavening, for a delightful and healthy dessert easy to make at home. The tart is a perfect dessert to enjoy for breakfast, and the tart with fresh pears and ricotta is really a treat not just for breakfast, it’s also great for a snack or to serve at the end of a meal, delicious in summer served cold from the fridge, with a crumbly shortcrust shell and a fresh and moist filling given by the pears that caramelize during cooking and blend with the ricotta creating a perfect mix of flavor and creaminess. So what are you waiting for, prepare the pear and ricotta tart with me, it’s really delicious, of course, you can prepare it all year round, maybe in winter you simply won’t need to keep it in the fridge if it’s cool enough at home, or you can always keep it in the fridge and take it out a bit before serving, so it’s not too cold.
- Difficulty: Very Easy
- Cost: Economical
- Preparation time: 15 Minutes
- Portions: 8
- Cooking methods: Oven
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: All Seasons
Ingredients for Pear and Ricotta Tart
- 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 eggs
- 2/3 cup sugar
- 7 tbsps olive oil
- grated lemon zest
- 1 1/3 cups ricotta
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1 lb Coscia pears (or similar)
- 3 tbsps sugar
- 1/2 lemon juice
- 1 oz cocoa-flavored Pavesini cookies
Tools to Prepare Pear and Ricotta Tart
- 1 Bowl
- 1 Cutting Board
- 1 Knife
- 1 Baking Pan
Steps to Prepare Pear and Ricotta Tart
Let’s start by preparing the shortcrust pastry. In a bowl, put the flour and sugar, make a well in the center, and add the eggs, olive oil, and lemon zest, working to obtain a homogeneous dough, knead well to obtain a dough that doesn’t break. Place in the fridge while preparing the filling.
In a bowl, work the ricotta with the sugar, mix well, and let it rest. I used buffalo ricotta in this case, but cow or sheep ricotta is fine too.
Peel the pears, cut them into cubes, add the sugar and lemon juice, mixing them well in a bowl, the weight 1 lb is gross weight before peeling and cutting.
Take the shortcrust pastry, roll it out on a well-floured surface with a rolling pin, if you can’t roll it out easily, it means you haven’t kneaded it enough, so knead it more and try again to roll it out.
With the shortcrust about 1/4 inch thick, line a tart pan 10-11 inches, I used a silicone mold, but even if using a metal mold, there’s no need to butter and flour the mold, but flour the base of the shortcrust that goes into the mold well.
Cut off all excess shortcrust and recompact it into a dough, it will be used to make the strips to decorate our tart.
At this point, use a fork to poke holes all over the base of our tart. On the shortcrust, place a thin layer of crumbled cookies, I used cocoa-flavored Pavesini cookies, crushed them in the bag, and spread them so that the shortcrust stays dry despite the filling with pears that release water.
Add the pears to the ricotta cream and pour the content into the shortcrust lined mold over the Pavesini cookies.
On the floured surface, roll out the leftover shortcrust, cut out 8 strips, and decorate our pear and ricotta tart.
Bake the tart in a preheated static oven at 350°F in the middle for about 45 minutes, or until the shortcrust is golden brown.
Remove from the oven and let cool before flipping like an omelet onto a platter. Sprinkle with powdered sugar and store in the fridge, excellent to serve nice and cold, it will also cut perfectly. I, on the other hand, cut it while it was still a bit warm because, as usual, I couldn’t wait to taste it.
Here is the slice after a brief stay in the fridge, already better.
