Pear Crisp

I always buy fruit thinking that I'll eat it, and then forget that I have it until it's almost bad. That's what prompted this recipe, because I bought 4 pears, ate one for lunch and then they got lost on my kitchen table behind the other groceries. I found them this morning, kind of mushy and almost bad, and decided to bake something with them. I found a recipe for a pear crisp online, and modified it to use with my three pears.

Ingredients:

3 pears

1 small lemon

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 & 1/2 tsp cornstarch

1 & 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

3/4 tsp nutmeg

1/4 cup flour

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1 & 1/2 tbsp chilled butter, cut into small pieces 

1/4 cup regular oats

I used salted butter because I accidentally bought it instead of unsalted. If you use unsalted butter, add 1/4 tsp salt in with the flour mixture in step 5.

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375°.

2. Cut up pears however you prefer. I diced them, but you could also slice them and arrange them all fancy.

3. Mix the juice of one lemon in with the pear pieces and toss to coat.

4. Combine granulated sugar, cornstarch, 1 tsp cinnamon and 1/2 tsp nutmeg and add to the pear pieces.

5. Combine flour, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp nutmeg, brown sugar and oats. Add the chilled butter and mix until it is a course texture. I don't have a food processor, so the easiest way for me to do this is with my hands. You can also use a fork and do it that way as well.

6. Put pear pieces into a baking dish and sprinkle the flour topping over it.

7. Bake for 40 minutes until the pears are bubbly and soft.

8. Serve with vanilla ice cream, of course.

I think there was a little too much topping for the small amount of pears I had, so I would probably cut everything down by a bit. That makes for awkward measurements though. A little less that 1/4 cup is not very precise. Just eyeball it and hope it turns out ok. That's pretty much what I did for this recipe, so as long as you keep the proportions mostly similar, it should turn out fine!