Most cooks, I’m sure, will always put their leftovers to good use, reinventing them in surprising and imaginative ways but Massimo Bottura, whose restaurant Osteria Francescana in Italy is currently number 1 on The World’s Best 50 Restaurants list, lifted the world of leftovers out of the garbage bins and into true, heart-felt philanthropy.
Attending the Milan Expo last year, Massimo, along with fellow chefs including Rene Redzepi, were appalled by wasted food at the Expo and opened a ‘soup kitchen’ called Reffetorio Ambrosiano. They took the discarded food from the Milan Expo showground, re-cooked it and fed the city’s poor – to a very high standard indeed.
The Expo has closed but Reffetoria Ambrosiano still recycles leftover food and feeds the needy. Massimo’s philosophy is that food waste is bad no matter where you sit in the socio economic world.
The following recipe using two leftover poached pears is laughably inadequate given the above story but the resultant tart was pretty delicious and I’m always glad not to have contributed to further waste.
Rosie
POACHED PEAR AND HALVA TART
Serves 8-10
Makes enough for a 23cm x 23cm square tart tin or a 24cm – 28cm round tart tin
Pastry
250 gm Revenge gluten-free almond plain flour mix (see below)
85 gm caster sugar
1 pinch salt
65 gm butter, cold, cubed
1 whole egg, whisked
Place dry ingredients into a food processor and process for a couple of seconds to combine. Add cold butter cubes and process until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add egg and process. If the pastry is dry, add a teaspoon or two of iced water.
Place the pastry onto plastic wrap and pat into a disc about 1cm thick. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 160°C.
Remove pastry from fridge and knead until pliable. Roll out in between two pieces of baking paper and line tin with pastry. Place in the preheated oven for 10 minutes. If the pastry has risen, flatten it down with the palm of your hand or suitably flat implement and return to the oven for a further 10 minutes until lightly golden brown.
Pears
500 mls water
230 gm caster sugar
2 large pears, peeled, halved and cored
Place water and sugar, over a low heat, into a pan large enough to accommodate the pears in one layer. Stir to dissolve the sugar then bring to a simmer. Place the pear halves, flat side down, into the syrup and simmer, basting often, for around 10 minutes then turn the pears over and continue to simmer and baste for a further 10 minutes. Keep turning until the pears are tender. When cool enough to handle, remove from the syrup, slice each pear half lengthways into eight pieces. Reserve the syrup for another use.
Filling
2 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
250 mls pure cream
50 gm caster sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
100 gm halva, crumbled (or to taste)
4 poached pear halves, sliced
Whisk the eggs, egg yolks, cream, sugar and vanilla together until well combined.
Scatter the crumbled halva over the base of the blind baked tart case and arrange the pear slices over. Drizzle the custard over. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until the custard is just set. If the top of the tart hasn't coloured sufficiently, pop it under the grill for a minute or two. Cool on a rack.
When cool, transfer to a serving plate, dust with icing sugar. Serve with whipped cream.
REVENGE GLUTEN-FREE ALMOND PLAIN FLOUR MIX
280 gm almond meal
210 gm besan flour
280 gm fine white rice flour
175 gm corn flour
Whip up a batch and store in the fridge.