Money money money money, MONEY.
I’m currently on a wordpress.com blog, which means that even though I own my domain my terms of service do not allow me to advertise. Those of you who don’t have ad blockers might be scratching your heads right now because you see an ad asking you how old you think Javier Bardem is. Those ads are not mine: wordpress is advertising on my blog.
I’ve considered monetizing my blog before, but given the cost of self hosting I’ve always decided against it. My trafiic is pretty low and I know I won’t make a profit. Now that I’ve realized wordpress is making money off of me I’m starting to reconsider. I’m not doing this to make a profit, but I don’t like that someone else is reaping the rewards of my work.
Have any of you made the switch to self hosting? I’d love to hear any tips or recommendations you might have. I’d also love to hear opinions on the different advertising networks out there. Is it worth putting myself on a waiting list for Blogher? Are there any other good networks out there?
None of this has anything to do with the recipe I’m sharing today. I made this tart for a dinner with some friends. She loves pears, he loves custard, and their son just loves desserts. This tart had their names all over it. I really enjoyed the poached pears with the custard, poaching them with =cinnamon gave the tart an extra dimension of flavour.
I was a little worried that the crust would take longer to bake than the custard, but it worked out pretty well. I would have preferred that the crust be a little crisper, the texture I ended up with was almost cake like, probably because of the baking powder in the dough. Next time I think I’ll try with an unsweetened crust and blind bake it for a few minutes first.
Pastry Dough
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, cold and cut into pieces
- 1 egg
- 1 tbsp milk (if necessary)
- In a large bowl mix the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together. Add the butter, then using your fingers rub the butter into the flour until there are just a few small pieces of butter left and the mixture holds together when squeezed. Add the egg, stirring in with a fork. Stir until the dough comes together, adding the milk if necessary.
- With your hands form a ball with the dough then flatten it into a disk. Cover in plastic wrap a refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight. Dough will keep for three days in the fridge or can be frozen in an airtight bag.
- 4 large pears, peeled, halved and cored (melon ballers work well for coring pears)
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 cinnamon stick
- Place the pears in medium pot. Cover with cold water, then add the sugar and cinnamon stick. Place over medium heat and bring to a boil. Once boiling turn off the heat and let pears cool completely in the poaching liquid.
- Sweet pastry dough
- Poached Pears
- 3 tbsp all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 3 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2/3 cup whole milk
- 2 tbsp liquid honey
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- Icing sugar to top tart
- Preheat the oven to 325F
- Roll out the pastry dough till it’s large enough to fill a 9 inch tart pan. Place the dough snugly in the pan, trim off the edges. Arranged the poached pears on the dough.
- In medium bowl, whisk the flour sugar and eggs together. Stir in the vanilla. Add the milk mixing until well combined. Skim off any bubbles then pour around the pears.
- Bake for 40 to 45 minutes until the filling is set.
- Mix the honey and lemon juice together, using a pastry brush glaze the pears with honey mixture.
- Sprinkle with icing sugar.
- Let cool completely and serve at room temperature.
What She's Having 
Wow. That’s not good. I’m not sure why but I’m not seeing any ads. The tart you made is exquisite. It looks very tasty.
I don’t see them with Google Chrome, but if I use Explorer they are there. My mom was the one who pointed them out to me. I think it depends on your internet settings.
This looks amazing! I love pears!
Beautiful tart, Lynn! I am on blogger, so I don’t know about self-hosting through wordpress, but even if your traffic isn’t high, it’s nice to make a few pennies from your blog. Maybe enough to cover the cost of ingredients! That’s how I view it, anyway.
I stumbled your tart!
So pretty!
This looks so delicious it is irresistible! I have a new tart pan ready to be used for this recipe.
I came for the custard and pear tart but I have some thoughts for you regarding ads. I think you should run them…just be vigilant about filtering them so only the relevant and appropriate ones show up.
Incidentally, I also use WordPress.com. Are you sure you don’t have WordPress.org?
Back to your tart. It’s absolutely lovely and perfect for autumn. I love how you poach the pears!
I do not use wordpress, I use blogspot. On blogspot you can either have google ads and earn the profit from those, or sign up for something else like Blogher. I use FoodBuzz though to advertise and get the money from that. I like them a lot and there is no waiting list. If it makes you feel any better though I do not see any ads at the moment! :) And your poached pears an custard tart look divine!
Mmmm…your tart looks wonderful! I self-host my blog on WordPress which is really pretty inexpensive to do. I wanted the ability to control my blog and to grow it as needed.
The tart looks lovely
Beautiful tart, and one of my favorite kinds since I love all things pear when it comes to tarts!
Holy Moley!! Is this amazing or what?!
Wow, this is so beautiful! I can tell a lot of love went into making this tart.
Lovely! I’m also a lover of pears, eaten out of hand, in a salad or baked in a tart, I enjoy them in all their incarnations!
I took the Food Buzz adds off my blogger blog because I didn’t like the look of them for the small amount of money they paid me each month, I didn’t think it was worth hosting them. How to make money off blogging- that is the perennial question??? Maybe we should make something like pot holders or aprons and sell them to our followers? LOL- don’t quit your day job, I know;-)
Fantastic tart! It looks picture perfect.
I love your napkin with the birds! So adorable!
This tart looks incredible! I haven’t had a pear tart in so long. You’ve inspired me to change that.
I self host (my sites are hosted on bluehost) with wordpress as my blogging platform. I love it – I am a sucker for 100% control. I use foodbuzz for my ads now which isn’t bad – the best part is its huge community. I’ve used google adsense in the past for advertising and they pay a lot more. I’m about to convert my blog to an adless site though only because at my peak I was only seeing 10 to 20 bucks a month and for me I didn’t think it was worth it to distract readers with ads for that little amount of money. That and google was putting up mainly dieting ads and I think that was scaring my hungry readers ; )
Thank you for the kind words on my blog too!
Gorgeous! I am still trying to figure out how to rejigger my blog template, so I’m of no use to you on domain hosting advice.
at what temp does this bake at?
What temperature do you bake it?
325F. I’ve updated the post, thanks!
thanks, lynn. i actually figured it out. i have made the recipe a couple of times now and there are plenty of compliments…but i don’t care about that: i want the whole deal for myself. i’d rather they not like it!
Hi Lynn! Just want to let you know that I’ve made your tart several times in the past year and it’s always a hit. It’s light but flavorful, and usually something guests have never had before. I tend to slice the pears and fan them out a bit so that every bite has some custard and pear… but the ingredients remain the same. This recipe is definitely a winner. Thank you!
Thanks! It’s great to hear back from someone who tried a recipe.