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Poached pear

We had a delicious poached pear dessert at Bouchon. It was cold and sweet whole pear flavored with clove. Served with rum raisin ice cream.

Get:
  • 1 (750-ml) bottle white wine, Riesling or Viognier
  • 1 cup water
  • 5 ounces sugar, approximately 3/4 cup
  • 1 tbsp vanilla
  • 4 Bosc pears, peeled leaving the stem intact
Prep:
  • Core the pears from the bottom (seeds are near the base so you don't have to go that deep
  • Peel pears, leaving stem intact

Do:
  • Place the white wine, water, sugar and vanilla bean and pulp into a 4-quart saucepan over medium-high heat and bring to a boil.
  • Decrease the heat to medium low and place the pears into the liquid
  • cover and simmer for 30 minutes or until the pears are tender but not falling apart.
  • Remove the pears to a serving dish, standing them upright, and place in the refrigerator.
  • Increase the heat to medium-high until starting to boil
  • Reduce heat and simmer, reducing the syrup to approximately 1 cup of liquid, approximately 20 to 25 minutes.
  • Do not allow the syrup to turn brown.
  • Chill the sauce
  • Serve pear in bowl with sauce poured over it, with rum raisin or salted caramel ice cream
Results:
  • All 4 pears felt the same when they were cooked, but after simmering 2 of them were gushy and two of them were still far too hard. Pay more attention next time to pear ripeness, I guess?
  • The gushy pears tasted pretty awesome.
  • The sauce takes a long time to reduce. 1 cup is about right, I tried leaving it at 2 cups and it was still too watery.
  • I added cinnamon and clove, but I think it burned or toasted or something, because it turned into little flecks and was brown.
  • The sauce was a bit tart, so I think it burned a bit. It probably should have been heated less severely. It might also have been the vanilla extract that was bitter.


References:
Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/vanilla-poached-pears-recipe/index.html?oc=linkback