Hooked on phonics, worked for my streussel

I'm not a huge fan of fresh pears. Sometimes I like them, but sometimes the skins have this grainy, bitter aftertaste. But, it is now apple and pear season here in Zurich, so I had to try something with all the lovely fruit.

It started with the cheater way of making a dessert - halve some baking apples, take out the cores, and smush the now-empty core area with a mixture of granola, brown sugar and butter. Bake. Yum. Oh, and you can serve with ice cream. More yum.

And then I finally found my Joy of Cooking, packing amidst all the book boxes, and I flipped to "pear." And in there is Pear Streussel Tart....ha HA. I looked through the ingredients: flour, brown sugar (uh oh, not sure if they have that here), chopped walnuts (time to buy that food processor or hand blender thingy), pears, cinammon, salt. Ok, well, if I can find brown sugar, I'd make it.

Turns out, the raw sugar they sell here, in some forms, is very much like brown sugar. Especially the raw moscovado chunks we bought for the sugar bowl. We were kind of skeptical at first about the specialty foods lady's thoughts about raw=molasses, but it is definitely full of deep dark color and flavor. Side note: the middle-aged store clerks, pharmacists, etc, here are worth learning to trust. These people have not only had many years' experience, they actually apprenticed initially for their jobs. Twice now (with the brown sugar, and with some foot creme) they have utterly shamed our "no that can't be right" attitudes with their quiet but firm certitude. Yeah, trust these folks, otherwise you're kind of just cheating yourself.

So 2 weeks ago, pear streussel tart #1 got made (sans pastry crust on the bottom), and it was spectacular. Didn't last too long either with random forkfulls being taken from the dish in the fridge. The only issue I had was the cutting in of the butter. I guess I gave away the butter slicer I used to use for scones, and there I was, using two knives pretty ungracefully to get small pieces of butter to put in the streussel ingredients. And it really didn't come out all crumbly like the recipe said it would. So some parts got butter and others didn't. Hmmm.

Well, today there was time (and pears) for another streussel. I pulled out the Joy of Cooking again, and started reading the recipe. Maybe I could put the butter and other ingredients into the little hand blender container and pulse it all into.....hey wait.

Wait, it says "melted butter"....

Huh? Oh, like soft....no, then it would have said "softened" genius.

Yup, melted. So, like, liquid.

Oops.

I guess that explains my problems last time.

(I melt the butter and pour over the sugar, nuts and flour, and start mixing with a fork)

Ha. ha ha. um, ha. Yeah, that would be the crumbly texture I didn't get last time.

So much for speed reading when it comes to cooking.