Preheat the oven to 400F.

Peel, slice in half long ways, and core your pears. In a bowl, toss with a tablespoon of your booze of choice, if you're going that route :)

Have your pie dough/puff pastry rolled out into a 10" circle and ready to go.

Make caramel in a 9" skillet pan: melt the butter and then add the sugar; watch and smell the caramel very diligently, as it turns from a butter/sugary grainy combo into a smoother silky caramel. turn off the heat once puffs of smoke are given off and it clearly smells like caramel - the caramel will continue to cook once you remove it from the heat, so beware!!

Make a ring of pears towards the edges of the pan, over the caramel, in the frying pan, rounded sides down and narrower tips towards the center, if you care about details. Fill in the blanks as needed with pears.

Cover the pears with your puff pastry/pie dough circle, and cut a few slits in the middle so steam can escape.

Place into the oven and cook for about 30 minutes, until the pastry is golden brown.

Remove from the oven and let stand a minute or two cool slightly, then set a serving plate upside down on top of the skillet. Lift the skillet and the plate together, and flip quickly to invert the tart tatin. If any fruit is stuck in the skillet, simply replace/rearrange on the tart.

Serve with whipped cream or ice cream!!!