Photo and text by KARA DiCAMILLO, ecoRI.org
With September coming to an end, I wanted to highlight National Honey Month, a celebratory month that has been held annually during the month of September since 1989. The purpose of it is to promote beekeeping and it’s significant for beekeepers because it signifies the end of honey collection for the year.
Did you
know that bees travel some 55,000 miles and tap more than 2 million flowers
just to make a pound of honey?
Many of our fruits and vegetables rely on honeybee pollination. Almonds depend 100 percent on honeybee pollination, while apples, avocados, blueberries, cherries, cranberries and sunflowers are 90 percent reliant on honeybees, according to the National Honey Board.
Many of our fruits and vegetables rely on honeybee pollination. Almonds depend 100 percent on honeybee pollination, while apples, avocados, blueberries, cherries, cranberries and sunflowers are 90 percent reliant on honeybees, according to the National Honey Board.
Here in Rhode Island we have several farms and apiaries whose raw honey products are sold locally: Aquidneck Honey (Middletown); Betty’s Bee Farm (Glendale), Harmony Farms (Harmony); Littlefield Bee Farm (Block Island); River Farm (Saunderstown); Trail’s End Farm (Jamestown) and Wishing Stone Farm (Little Compton).
This
week I used less sugar in my recipe and incorporated honey. These tarts are
easy to make; it took me just a few minutes of prep time. The result is an
impressive dessert for guests, and now you can impress them with a few facts
about honey, too.
Pear
Tarts with Honey
Makes 4
1 sheet
of puff pastry, defrosted
3 cups of sliced pears, peeled and sliced crosswise into quarter-inch slices
Quarter cup of sugar
3 tablespoons of unsalted butter, small-diced
2 tablespoons of honey
Powdered sugar, for sprinkling
3 cups of sliced pears, peeled and sliced crosswise into quarter-inch slices
Quarter cup of sugar
3 tablespoons of unsalted butter, small-diced
2 tablespoons of honey
Powdered sugar, for sprinkling
Preheat
oven to 400 degrees and prepare the pears.
Cut the
sheet of puff pastry into 4 squares and place on a sheet pan that is lined with
parchment paper. Place overlapping slices of pear diagonally across the pastry
and then one slice on each side of the arranged slices around the edges.
Sprinkle the pears evenly with sugar, and then dot them evenly with butter.
Bake for
40 minutes, until the pastry is browned around the edges and the pears are
browned as well. The juices and sugars will burn around them in the pan, but
don’t worry because the tarts will be fine.
When the tarts are finished, heat the honey in the microwave and then drizzle it evenly over the top of the tarts. Loosen the tarts with a spatula so they don’t stick to the paper, and then place them on a rack to cool.
I like to eat them warm, but you can also serve them at room temperature. Sprinkle with a bit of powdered sugar and enjoy.
When the tarts are finished, heat the honey in the microwave and then drizzle it evenly over the top of the tarts. Loosen the tarts with a spatula so they don’t stick to the paper, and then place them on a rack to cool.
I like to eat them warm, but you can also serve them at room temperature. Sprinkle with a bit of powdered sugar and enjoy.
