• Peel the ginger piece
• Use a knife to shave partial cuts into the ginger, so that has lots of slices in it but is still in one whole piece.  The ginger will flavor the simple syrup, but you want to remove it from the final product, so you're making a piece of ginger with lots of surface area but that is still one piece that's easy to fish out of the syrup later.  If you want a stronger ginger flavor, you could mince the ginger and then strain it out at the end instead.
• Put the water into a small sauce pan over medium heat.
• Add the brown sugar
• Add the piece of ginger
• Add the bourbon
• Bring to a simmer while stirring.  You can let some of the water boil away, although it's fine even if the syrup is pretty watery.  Just don't burn the sugar.
• Simmer for 10-20 minutes.  You can add more bourbon or more ginger here, to taste.  The mixture will taste pretty strong, but it will dilute a lot when you pour it into the mildly flavored pear.
• Pour into pyrex and let sit in the freezer.  You don't want to pour the mixture into the cold pears while it's still hot.

• Peel, core, and coarsely dice the pears.
• Combine in a blender and puree until smooth.
• Add the lemon juice.  The lemon will help slow down the color change of the pear meat.
• Add the yogurt.  This adds a slightly creamy texture.  You could skip it if you want a thinner, vegan soup, or you could try cream for a thicker, more buttery taste.
• Remove the ginger from the syrup.
• Add the syrup to the mixture.  Don't add the syrup while it's hot.
• Blend until smooth and evenly mixed.
• Chill the mixture until ready to serve.

Plating & garnish