A Glut of Pears

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!

Log Cabin Quilt in a Day

I have recently started a quilting course, making a sampler quilt with a block a week as the focus. I have never quilted before, aside from a crazy patchwork bear that I made in the Girl Guides and an attempt to sew squares of fabric together at some point after that. I had wanted to try patchwork for a long time, so when I found the quilting course at a shop relatively nearby, Thread Bear, http://www.thread-bear.co.uk/, I jumped at the chance. And I am now addicted. Fabric is my drug of choice, and my only regret is that my little pink sewing machine is buried in storage, although I have to say that I am starting to think that I should upgrade to a porshe of the sewing world, a sewing machine that will quilt with amazing stitches. But as long as I can borrow a machine for the course, I can take my time researching.

I have included the block from my sampler quilt above, but this blog is to talk about the second course I signed up to one recent Saturday, to make a Log Cabin Lap Quilt in a day. The history of the log cabin quilt may even date back as far as the Ancient Egyptian period, but seems to have found it's own identity in pioneering America. The centre square represents the hearth, and is usually red or arange, with the strips considered to be logs of the log cabin. Traditionally, there is a dark side and a light side, perhaps to represent that the log cabins often only had windows on one side, although some consider it prehaps as a more moral message - the light and the dark side of life, or happiness and sorrow. Log cabins with a black centre where supposedly used by the Underground Railway Quilters to symbolise to slaves in North America the houses that were supporters and would help them with food, clothing and accomodation and further help them to escape. With such an amazing history it felt fantastic to continue such a beautiful and traditional craft.

The first, exciting part was to decide on the colour scheme of my quilt. Several days before, I had been driving to see a friend in the country, past rows of gorgeous Autumnal trees, turning from green to golden with splashes of orange and plum in between. I was decided. I wanted the quilt to have an Autumnal feel. So passed hours choosing fabric, with everyone at Thread Bear being so patient and helpful, giving great advice and even providing copious amounts of tea.

Originally, I had wanted to have a plum centre, with light to dark greens one side and yellow, orange and red strips on the other side. That didn't work, and so I changed my mind and decided to go with the colours below. A yellow leaf pattern to border the quilt, and an apple pattern on the back, with a binding of brown fabric with acorns dotted on it makes it more Autumnal than Christmassy.

Kate taught us a process of making log cabin blocks that was so quick and easy that it really was, incredibly, possible to make most of the quilt in a day. It was a lap quilt, so we made 16 squares, using what is called a washing line technique. You cut all of the 16 centre squares with a rotary cutter, and a number of long strips in your other colours. You then sew the first strip to the centre on all the squares, snip it to size, and then sew the second strip to all 16 squares, and so on to build up all the blocks. I didn't take any photos of this process but Lisa, who was also on the course, has some lovely ones on her blog Lisa's Stitching Life: http://lisa-iris.blogspot.com/

Perhaps my favourite part was when I got home. I laid out the blocks in a variety of patterns. Below were some of the choices and effects - you can see how it can totally change the look of the quilt:

A more tradiditonal pattern - I felt it worked well, but wanted something a little less structured to resemble falling leaves.

An overall star pattern - I just felt this looked too strong with the red, and too Christmassy as well.

A cross pattern - depending on how you place the squares- you could see the above would need a bit more playing with. It is interesting how the overall effect can be so different, even thought you are using exactly the same blocks.

In the end I chose a pattern that was rather unusual as opposed to the more traditional ones. It has a centre hourglass, with an almost wavy, slightly more organic effect. My choice made, I sewed up the front panel, added the back, and started quilting it by sewing through buttons of leaves in autumn colours. Tiredness did eventually send me to bed with my quilt all but finished, apart from some more buttons to sew on to quilt it together, and the acorn binding to add. I love it! I am now just wondering if I can bear to give it away as a Christmas present....