Pears Poached in Ginger Wine
Pears Cooked in Ginger Wine
Mamta Gupta
A simple and easy, yet delicious dessert to make for a small dinner party. Many versions are available on the internet. Firm varieties of pears like Conference are best, do not use over-ripe or soft pears for this recipe. If you do not have ginger wine, add ginger to ordinary wine. Red wine also works very well; I used to make it in red wine quite often in the 80s and 90s, see last picture. Use a sweet variety of wine. Serves 6 or 12.
Ingredients
12 small or 6 large, firm pears with stalks
1 bottle of ginger wine
Juice of a lemon (about 2 tbsp.)
A few strands of saffron
50 gm. sugar
Instructions
If using large pears, leave stalks intact. Serving one pear with stalk in a plate looks nice.
Peel the pears. Place in a bowl of water to which lemon juice has been added, to stop discolouration.
Place ginger wine, saffron and sugar in a saucepan and bring to boil. Pears should be covered in wine, so use a pan size that will allow this. Too large a pan will not let them cook covered in wine.
Add pears, bring to boil and reduce heat.
Simmer on gentle heat for 20-30 minutes or until the pears are soft. Turn the heat off.
Lift pears out and place in a serving dish.
Continue to boil the syrup/wine the wine, until it is reduced to half or less, a syrup consistency. Spoon the syrup over the pears.
Serve hot with ice-cream or fresh cream. You can make it in advance, but heat it in a microwave oven for a couple of minutes before serving.
You can garnish pears with flaked almonds, but in my opinion, they are great as they are.