A pair of pear recipes

I have a lot of pears. I don't know why I persist in buying fruits and veggies in bulk. They are usually unripe when I get them, then they all ripen so quickly a few go bad.

Let my Costco membership be your gain, with the recipes for Perys in Confyte and Perys en Composte from A Boke of Gode Cookery. Gode Cookery was one of the first websites I found when I became interested in food that was accurate to a pretty wide SCA time period. I love the website and it has a ton of other vegetarian/vegan options and some really delicious meaty recipes as well, if I recall that correctly. 

Perys in Confyte

I omitted red food coloring, but followed all the steps listed there. This recipe is not vegan due to honey, but I imagine that if you felt like leaving out the honey you could use maple syrup or agave nectar, though it will change the taste.

3 lbs/about 6 pears, peeled, cored, and thickly sliced. - I used D'Anjou because they're what I have

1/3 cup/105grams honey

1/3 cup sugar

1/2 tsp mixed cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg

1 tsp powdered anise seed mixed with 1/4 tsp sugar

A few threads of saffron

1/2 cup red wine - used zinfandel because it was on our booze shelf

1 tbsp cider vinegar

Boil the pears in water until they are just tender. I'd say maybe about 5 minutes. Add about 1/8 cup of water to the anise and sugar mixture so that you have a thin sauce. Bring the honey to a low boil (Gode Cookery calls for skimming the scum off the top of the honey, but I never had anything resembling scum). Add sugar, spices, and anise sauce and continue cooking until sugar is dissolved. Gently stir in pears and the wine & vinegar. cook for a few more minutes, until pears have warmed, then remove from heat.

You guys, this was delicious! I ate it warm. I'd say it makes enough for 6-8 small servings and could definitely be made well ahead of time and frozen and reheated. 

Perys en Composte

As above, I omitted the red food coloring. This recipe is vegan. 

2 cups red wine

2 tbsp cinnamon

1 tbsp sugar

1/2 cup sliced dates

4-6 peeled cored and thinly sliced pears

pinch of salt

Boil the pears in water until tender, drain and set aside. In another pan mix together the red wine, cinnamon and sugar. Heat them up, then strain the mixture to remove the cinnamon. I used a cheesecloth and a sieve. Put the sauce in a large pan and reheat, then add the sliced dates, pears, and salt. Let it cool before serving. 

Oh my goodness, guys. This recipe was a freaking disaster for me. I ended up being a bit distracted and the wine mixture started to boil. So I quickly removed it from the heat to strain. Leaving it to its own devices meant the straining took a good few hours. Mostly because I left it there while I caught up on some other things. I think this is for a few reasons. . . .the cinnamon gummed up the works, the boiling started to make a syrup, etc.  Basically the wine mixture turned into a gelatinous goopy mess and could have been used on a horror set to emulate a puddle of blood.

What I'd do differently next time is use cinnamon sticks and keep a closer eye on the wine mixture. As this recipe stood at the beginning? pass. Not a fan of the flavor, the texture, any of it. 

I salvaged it by adding about another cup of wine to pot and simmering it for about an hour. 

The first pear recipe is my preferred recipe, though.