I am very lucky to have a pear tree growing in my garden. Last year, I searched on-line for any tip I could get about when to know that the pear was ready to harvest. I kept going down into the garden, waiting for the pear to fall from the tree when I cupped it in my hand and twisted. Finally, I got impatient with it and plucked two off that seemed relatively willing. I then put them on my kitchen bench to wait for them to ripen. A week later, I bit into one with a crunch. The waiting game continued, but despite my best intentions, I lost track of time and before I realised it the snow was covering everything and the gleaming yellow globes where providing fodder for the birds.
This year I was determined to be more productive, so several weekends ago I went to my local supermarket for a cardboard fruit box to store the pears in when the time came, and my vigil began. However, I just couldn't determine if they were ripe, so last Sunday my patience came to an end and I went down to grab my boxful of produce. I picked every pear I could physically lay hands on, even breaking a branch in my eagerness to pull as much as I could into my grasping palms. I had been planning all week what to do with them, and today it was time to use the glut.
Preserving Pears
(from Buster Bucks Blog)
2 cups of sugar
4 cups of water
Disolve the sugar in the water. Add the pears, and then boil them. Ladle into sterilised jars (I just put a load of jars through the dishwasher). Turn the jars upside down for 10 minutes or so to make sure they are sealed.
Pear and Vanilla Jam
(slightly varied from the recipe on the blog 'Food in Jars' - I used Jam Sugar instead of sugar and pectin - so much easier)
4 cups of jam sugar
8 cups of chopped pears
2 Vanilla pods, opened and scrapped
Bring to the boil all of the contents. Remove the vanilla pods and mash the pears. Bring to a rolling boil for 10 minutes. Bottle in sterilised jars.
I think that this will be my favourite of the pear recipes - the smell of the vanilla cooking with the pears was utterly delicious.
Pear Chutney
(Slightly varied from a James Martin recipe - I didn't have any rosemary, used brown sugar instead of demera, stem ginger instead of preserved, and added a quince, which I had left over from making Nigella's recipe. I hope these changes and additions will make it lovely - although I think the slicing of the pears into wedges is a worry as it seems very chunky)
60ml olive oil
- 200g sultanas
100g raisins
100g brown sugar
400ml cider vinegar
100g preserved stem ginger, finely sliced
700g pears coared and cut into wedges
100g of quince, diced
½ tsp salt
½ tsp nutmeg
2 tsp ground allspice or mixed spice
1 good pinch of saffron
1. Heat a large saucepan with the oil, add the sultanas, raisins and sugar and fry them until the fruit begins to caramelise.
2. Pour in the vinegar and boil on a high heat for three minutes. Then add the rest of the ingredients, bring to the boil, then turn to a simmer and cook until most of the liquid has evaporated. Because of the fruit, this chutney has a tendency to stick to the bottom of the pan, so stir it well and keep an eye on it. Don't let the pears cook too much; they should keep their shape.
3. Spoon it into clean hot jars, filling them as full as you can, and seal while hot. Store in the fridge.
Pear Nut Cake
(Adapted from Mary Cadogan's Pear, Hazelnut and Chocolate Cake)
I did include the recipe for this put didn't like it so have deleted it - I'm sure the original was lovely, and mine looked good in the pictures, but I think tampering with the recipe did not give a good result this time!
Mulled Pears
Sliced Pears
1 bottle of red wine
Sprinkling of sugar
1 Teaspoon of mixed spice
Boil all the ingrediants for about 10 minutes (I kept a lid on to make sure that it wouldn't dry out). I'm not sure if it will preserve or not, as perhaps there won't be enough sugar in the mix. It was flavoured like mulled wine in terms of sweetness. Anyway, we'll see.
I had also bought two punnets of plums a week ago, some of which I had already had to throw away, and two quinces, which were too expensive to let rot in the fruit bowl. I had been meaning to cook with them all week, and knew I needed to take advantage of this production zone to use this produce as well. So incredibly, I also managed to make:
Nigella's Quince Brandy (minus all of the flavourings as I didn't have any in the house - I might get some cinnamon and vanilla to add later but not the star anise!)
A
Ginger Sponge: a sponge recipe with some preserved stem ginger in it (I was experimenting with a recipe I wanted to submit for a competition - unfortunately it didn't really work as the sponge was sticky and and one side broke up, the other one caved in slightly. Still, it was utterly delicious as a desert).
A small jar of
Plum Jam
I weighed the plums that I had (about 8) and then put half that amount of sugar into the recipe. I boiled for 10 minutes to make the jam.
After spooning some over my sponge, I bottled the remainder into a small jar.
My desert of
Ginger Sponge with Plums and Cream was gorgeous - delicious, sticky, gingery and sweet, with a hint of cool creaminess from the drizzle of cream over the top. It didn't matter that the sponge was a bit of a flop after all as the result was divine!
I was delighted to achieve so much in an afternoon. It really was very easy - the biggest task was peeling and cutting the pears. I had organised my day as well in such a way that I was building on the flavours and techniques of each successive dish, so I only needed to wash out the pan each time before starting the next batch. The only thing is that, try as I did, I could not get through all the pears! I'll be taking a bag with me to quilting class and to work tomorrow to see if anyone else has some pear recipes they can try. And if I'm lucky, I may get to taste their efforts too!
