St Valentine's Menu (3) / Dessert: Belle Hélène Pears, "revisitées"

Well, finally..after the entrée, and the main course, we have got to the dessert with these traditionally French Belle Hélène Pears (Poires Belle Hélène). Is there a bistro or a brasserie in France that will not have among other mouth-watering "gourmandises", these decandent pears dressed in melted chocolate, with vanilla ice-cream and Chantilly cream "snowed" with almond flakes? Not many.... 

But today's version is "revisitée", that means that I took my license to make some changes..What's more, the way of presenting this dessert is what is called now in France "dessert à l'assiette", i.e. a playful and why not whimsical arrangement of the elements in a dessert....I would say an opportunity to show personality, taste, or to transmit a concept, an idea....


For the poached pears, you will need:
 * pears, 2 (firm, not to ripe)
 * water, 600gr
 * sugar, 60 gr
 * cinnamon, 1 stick
 * lemon, 1/2
 * vanilla, 1 pod, cut lengthwise and grated
 * star anise, 1
Put the water and sugar in a tall saucepan, and bring it to a boil. Peel the pears, keeping the pod. Place the pears in the saucepan, together with the lemon, and the spice. Lower the heat to simmer. Poach for 15' aprox. Check with a toothpick. Let them cool in the syrup.

For the vanilla ice-cream (1 litre), you will need:
 * whole milk, 150 ml   
 * cream, 500 ml
 * vanille, a pod, cut lengthwise and grated
 * egg yolks, 7
 * sugar, 150 gr
In a saucepan, place the milk, cream, and the vanilla pod. Take it to a boil. Turn off the heat and let it infuse for 30'. Sieve. In another saucepan, whisk the yokes and sugar until pale and thick; slowly pour the milk/cream into the yolks (the milk shouldn't be hot!!!), stir well. Take the saucepan to low heat, constantly stirring until the mixture coats the back of the spoon (aprox 80°C, it shouldn't boil !!!) Good !! You have made a "crème anglaise". Now put it to "bain Marie inverse", i.e. fill a bowl with water and ice-cubes, and put inside a bowl with your cream...like this, you will stop the cooking process. Let it cool. If you have the time, place it in the refrigerator 12 hours. Make the icecream following your ice-cream maker instructions.

For the Pain d'épice, you will need:
 * egg, 4
 * butter, soft, 250 gr
 * all-purpose flour, 250 gr
 * cane sugar (cassonade), 200 gr
 * almond flour, 100 gr
 * baking powder, 7gr
 * honey, 2 tablespoons
 * cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, 1/2 coffeespoon each.  
 * star anise, 1
Pre-heat oven at 180°C. Coat a cake mold with baking spray. In a stand mixer, with a paddle attachment, mix the butter and sugar until creamy. Add the eggs one by one, mixing well after each addition. Then, fold in the spices and honey. Sift the flours, and baking powder, and add by hand to the batter. Put it in the mold. Bake for 45/50'. Let it cool.

For the whipped cream:

 * heavy cream, 400 gr

 * powdered sugar, 80 gr

 * vanilla extract, 2 drops

Put all the ingredients in a siphon, charge it with gas. Refrigerate at least 8 hours.

To assemble:

 * Cut 2 layers of 0.5cm from the pain d'épice. With a ring mold of 9cm diameter, cut 2 circles.

(you can use the ring mold of the size/shape you want. Since we will fill the mold with icecream, put some aluminum foil under the ring) Fill the ring with vanilla icecream. The pain d'épice is the base of this mini-icecream cake. Put it in the freezer.

 * Cut 2 pears alongside. Cover the two halves that have the stems with a very light chocolate ganache (the idea is not to have a hard chocolate shell, but a light, velvet chocolate appearance...) As in any classic ganache, heat 100grs of heavy cream, pour over 100gr of chocolate, previously cut in small pieces. Fold well until creamy. For extra brilliance add a teaspoon of glucose in gel, or equivalent in butter. Mix well with hand processor, without letting air in (as you see in the photo of the Lenôtre chef here)

 * For the Chocolate Millefeuille, melt 100 grs of chocolate in bain Marie, spread the chocolate very thinly on a silpat, cover it with parchement paper. Refrigerate 30'. Carefully, remove the silpat (the chocolate will be stuck to the parchment paper. Using a ruler, and a small but sharp knife, cut the chocolate into rectangles (here 7x3 cm) Remove paper. Refrigerate until serving time. (Ideally, chocolate should be tempered, but I will devote a whole post to that in the future...) With the same melted chocolate, make figures on silpat for decoration. With the other part of the pears, cut 6x3 rectangles for the Millefeuille.

And then, it is your imagination, your personality! I decorated adding some small pieces of "golden leaf"...I used the water from the poached pears to make a spice syrup (same quantity of pear water, same quantity of sugar, heated until thick in texture). I put a little bit on the ice-cream and sprinkled this with dried pain d'épice crumbs, some chocolate decorations, cinnamon on the whipped cream....

It's your Valentine's dinner....it's up to you !!!!

Oh, let's not forget the coffee....."et oui ! Le chocolat doit être belge"....(Chocolate must be from Belgium) Believe me, I am not getting a single cent for this publicity (LOL)..but aren't these hearts adorable? and the quality of chocolate...super !!!!

Enjoy it !