A dear friend of mine has pears trees but never uses them. I am the lucky one that gets to have them. Getting an overabundance of them has led me to try to be creative with them. I made a large bath of pear sauce by peeling, coring and cutting the pears into small pieces. Then I put enough water to cover them in a saucepan and added a smidgeon of cinnamon and about 1/2 cup of sugar.
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With a beautiful Indian summer and a surplus of fruit, this recipe would be a perfect dessert for fruit lovers.
Dissolve lemon gelatin in 1 cup boiling water and 1 cup juice (strained from canned pears). Pour into measuring cup.
Combine pears, peppers and onions. Mix salt and water and pour over mixture. Use enough water to cover. Let stand overnight. Drain and rinse with fresh water.
Recipe for Cinnamon Pears. Drain juice from can of Bartlett pears (1 lb size). Add 1/3 cup red cinnamon candies and 2 drops of red food coloring.
Here are the questions asked by community members. Read on to see the answers provided by the ThriftyFun community.
Does anyone have any recipes for preserving pears in liqueurs?
By joy from Gloucestershire
Pears Preserved in 80-Proof Brandy
Peel and remove cores and seed, and cut pears in fourths or if very large pears, make them into 8 long slices. Sprinkle on sugar and fresh lemon juice to help them retain color.
Add them to sterilized jars and sprikle on more sugar. Do not pack too tightly. Add enough 80 proof brandy (you might even be able to find pear brandy and that would be perfect). You can always
resort to my favorite old stand-by, 100 proof Southern Comfort. I think it only comes in 70 proof and 100 proof now. The 70 proof might work just fine. I never tried it though. Don't forget the sugar.
Put on caps and rings, and leave them on the countertop for a day, then turn them upside down
and leave them for another day. Flip them over a couple of times each day to distribute the sugar.
After day 2, refrigerate them and leave them for about a month. Do it now, and they'll be well-ready for Thanksgiving. Don't forget to give them a little shake a couple of times a week.
As a last resort, cook the pears in water with the same amount of sugar as you have pears (by weight). When the pears are very soft, strain the juice (syrup) and add 3 cups of it to a quart bottle, then add 1 cup of 80 proof vodka. Put the lid on the bottle and set it in a dark corner of a lower cabinet. Leave it for a month untouched. You will end up with the best cordial you ever put over ice-cream or sipped from a cordial glass.
The pears that you cooked in the syrup may be eaten on pound cake or ice-cream. Either is delicious.
One of our favorite "Spirited Dried Fruits" is dried apples in Southern Comfort. You just dump the dried apples into a quart jar, add 1/2 cup sugar and fill the jar with Southern Comfort. Leave in the back of the refrigerator for a month, shaking it about 3-4 times a week to distribute sugar, and serve with a thick slice of Extra Sharp Cheddar Cheese and some good homemade bread or good wine crackers.
Enjoy everything.
Pookarina
The Ball Blue Book has a recipe for Spirited Pears. I tried it this year and they are wonderful. I used Brandy, Grand Mariner and Kahlua, gave them as gifts for the holidays.
Google "pears preserved in Liqueur". A bunch of recipes come up.
I need a recipe for pear honey or pear jam.
By Jude from Richfield, UT
Does pear preserves count?
1.5 cups sugar
3 cups water
1 lemon thinly sliced
1.5 cups sugar
6 medium cored, hard-ripe pears cut in halves or quarters
Combine 1.5 cups sugar and water, cook rapidly 2 minutes. Add pears and gently boil 15 minutes. Add remaining sugar and lemon, stirring until sugar dissolves. Cook rapidly until fruit is clear, about 25 minutes. Cover and let stand 12 to 24 hours in a cool place. Pack fruit into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch head space. Cook syrup 3 to 5 minutes or longer if too thin. Pour boiling hot, over fruit leaving 1/4 inch head space. Adjust caps. Process half pints and pints 20 minutes at 180 to 285 degrees F in hot water bath. Yield about 5 1/2 pints.
Note: if Seckel pears are used preserve whole with stem intact. Kiefers should be stored in a cool, dry place 3 to 5 weeks before using. A piece of preserved ginger may be added to each jar.
This was copied pretty verbatim from the Ball Blue Book.
Here is a great recipe for pear honey. I got it from a paula deen cookbook. It makes a lot of pear honey so I home canned a lot of it and gave it for Christmas Gifts.
www.mommyskitchen.net/
My favorite jam of all is Vanilla Pear Jam. It's amazing, and tastes like summer. Make sure you have fully ripe, sweet, flavorful pears.
4 c. peeled, finely chopped pears
1/4 c plus 1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
3 teaspoons pure vanilla
1 (1 3/4 ou) pack sugar-free pectin
4 c sugar
Mix all ingredients, stirring pectin in slowly and thoroughly. Bring to a boil. Boil hard (when you stir it, it doesn't stop boiling) for 1 minute. Leave 1/4 inch head space for half pints. Process 10 minutes.
The Ball canning book has many wonderful pear honey jam recipes. I just finished making some, made a lot of this last year. Also used grape/cherry tomatoes to use with the same recipe. Use clover honey for canning, not other kinds. This is good. Ball Blue Book has great recipes.
I used the pear tomato as well as the pears. In my regular cooking down of roma tomatoes, I dropped fresh pears from the tree that were soft, and they sweetened up without sugar, and no added pectin.
