Pears

I recently acquired 50 pounds of pears. All at once. Unexpectedly. It was dramatic.

The first thing I made was jam. I've never made jam before so this was technically an experiment.

Did I mention it was Candied Ginger Vanilla Pear Jam? No? Well it was.





It made two jars.

I made another batch.





Cherry Pear Jam. Another two jars.

At this point I completely gave up on that jam recipe I was using. I had 50 pounds of pears and after two batches of jam I hadn't even made a dent. I had to find a way to use up a lot of pears all at once.

I found a recipe on the Splendid Tablewebsite that called for 8 pounds of peeled, cored, and sliced pears. Rosemary, pear and Pine Syrup jam. It also said I was supposed to combine the sugar and the pears and let sit in the fridge overnight. Well, I did that. Then I forgot about them for about four days.

In the meantime I baked some of them.



These were so easy and SO good. Sprinkle the pears with butter and brown sugar, bake at 350F for 10 minutes. Pour in a little bit of something creamy. I used unsweetened almond milk. Bake for another 15-20 minutes. Serve warm. I made a second batch of these and added cinnamon and nutmeg to the brown sugar sprinkle and made a caramel sauce to serve with it. It was equally as yumtastical as the first batch.

Then I realized I could just pack them in syrup and store them that way. For some reason that was a major "Ah-ha moment."

The first batch was Cardamom Vanilla flavored.



Again with the two jars. Gah!

The next batch I just went crazy and peeled and cored as many pears as I could fit in the pot. It was Molasses and Honey flavored.



Five jars.

Plus I had a lot of syrup left over. I didn't want to waste it, but what can you do with water sweetened with molasses? I have to admit that I stared blankly at it for a really long time. Eventually I decided that what I had was just weird sugar water. Ok, what uses sugar water as a base? Candy. It wasn't a heavy enough syrup to make hard candy out of. Caramel.

I made Molasses Honey Pear Caramel sauce.



Holycrapnom!

Yes! At this point I've got just enough pears left to make the Jalepeno Pear Jam.



12 jars!!

I also finished that Rosemary jam recipe. I ended up leaving out the Pine Syrup. Partially because it's made from some specific type of pine tree that only grows in Italy. Mainly because costs $30 an ounce. Yeah, that's a big nevermind.



It made 14 jars.

Well, that's all I've got for now.

Later!




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