Gloria's post reminded me of a couple weeks ago. I got about half a
bushel of pears from a friend. Hard, not too sweet, not as flavorful
as I'd like, but what the heck. We spent a lot of time peeling and
coring, then cooked 'em down. Hard pears take a loooong time to cook
soft.

Mash 'em up and get pearsauce (like applesauce). Not *very* different
from applesauce because...well, by the time it's been seasoned and
spiced up, a lot of the taste was...spices. Still, it was pretty
good.

Wife jarred up some of the pearsauce. Shove the stick blender in the
rest, whhhrrr it thoroughly, and into the slow cooker with additional
odds and ends for an overnight run. Still wasn't quite ready in the
morning but by that afternoon it was nice and thick. I like pear
butter (and apple butter) that is thick enough to stand up on a butter
knife, and this stuff *was*.

Yield was only about eight jars. A couple will go to the friend who
gave me the pears, one to the MIL, one to the BIL, and the rest gets
et by wife and two daughters. I'll eat a little but still gotta watch
the sugar.

Terry

Terry wrote:
> Gloria's post reminded me of a couple weeks ago. I got about half a
> bushel of pears from a friend. Hard, not too sweet, not as flavorful
> as I'd like, but what the heck. We spent a lot of time peeling and
> coring, then cooked 'em down. Hard pears take a loooong time to cook
> soft.
>
> Mash 'em up and get pearsauce (like applesauce). Not *very* different
> from applesauce because...well, by the time it's been seasoned and
> spiced up, a lot of the taste was...spices. Still, it was pretty
> good.
>
> Wife jarred up some of the pearsauce. Shove the stick blender in the
> rest, whhhrrr it thoroughly, and into the slow cooker with additional
> odds and ends for an overnight run. Still wasn't quite ready in the
> morning but by that afternoon it was nice and thick. I like pear
> butter (and apple butter) that is thick enough to stand up on a butter
> knife, and this stuff *was*.
>
> Yield was only about eight jars. A couple will go to the friend who
> gave me the pears, one to the MIL, one to the BIL, and the rest gets
> et by wife and two daughters. I'll eat a little but still gotta watch
> the sugar.
>
> Terry

We put up almost thirty pint jars of pearsauce this year. Half with
ground cloves, half with ground allspice. I didn't make pear butter this
year but used the juice from straining the cooked, crushed pears to make
pear jelly. Lots and lots of pear jelly. The descendants tend to like my
pear jelly better than the other jellies I made this year. I added no
sugar to the pearsauce as the pears were sweet enough without it.

I gave several jars to the friend who allowed us to pick the 106 lbs of
pears from one of his two trees. Lawdy, the tree looked like nothing had
been picked from it, a good year for pears in SW Louisiana.

Terry wrote:
> Gloria's post reminded me of a couple weeks ago. I got about half a
> bushel of pears from a friend. Hard, not too sweet, not as flavorful
> as I'd like, but what the heck. We spent a lot of time peeling and
> coring, then cooked 'em down. Hard pears take a loooong time to cook
> soft.
>
> Mash 'em up and get pearsauce (like applesauce). Not *very* different
> from applesauce because...well, by the time it's been seasoned and
> spiced up, a lot of the taste was...spices. Still, it was pretty
> good.
>



I can remember back when my kids were just starting solid foods (and
before the days when Gerber and Beechnut were dirty words). I think
pearsauce was the second food that was recommended after applesauce. I
thought it was delicious, much more interesting flavor than apple.

gloria p

In article
>,
Ranee at Arabian Knits > wrote:
>
> Barb: would your method of extracting juice from fruit work with the
> pears as well? I'd love to get both jelly and butter.

If you're talking about nuking the fruit to cook it, it will if the
pears aren't overripe and you are very gentle when you mix them to
redistribute the fruit for cooking. Draining the juice really hastens
the cooking process to make fruit butter.
--
-Barb, Mother Superior, HOSSSPoJ
http://web.me.com/barbschaller - Yes, I Can! blog - check
it out. And check this, too: <http://www.kare11.com/news/
newsatfour/newsatfour_article.aspx?storyid=823232&catid=323>

Ranée at Arabian Knits wrote:
> In article >,
> Melba's Jammin' > wrote:
>
>> In article
>> >,
>> Ranee at Arabian Knits > wrote:
>>> Barb: would your method of extracting juice from fruit work with the
>>> pears as well? I'd love to get both jelly and butter.
>> If you're talking about nuking the fruit to cook it, it will if the
>> pears aren't overripe and you are very gentle when you mix them to
>> redistribute the fruit for cooking. Draining the juice really hastens
>> the cooking process to make fruit butter.
>
> Yes, that was what I meant. I will definitely try it, then. The
> pears are just starting to get ripe around here.
>


That juice contains a lot of the flavor (and pears don't have a lot to
spare.) Why not drain the juice into another wide stainless steel
saucepan and quickly boil it down to a syrup on the stove? Then add the
syrup back to the cooking pears.

Bob