[Sca-cooks] Pears

[Mark S. Harris]

Molli asked:
> Help! I came home from an event with a huge container filled with pears.
> Someone's tree seems to be producing heavily and I was blessed with some of
> that bounty. Maybe 10lbs worth. Since I'm not well versed in the area of
> preservation I need to ask for some ideas on how to best make use of these
> while they are fresh. Actually they mostly seem a bit under ripe. Can Pears
> be frozen? I've put up apple slices in the freezer with my Mom before but was
> wondering if I could do this with the Pears. Getting a batch of Pear cordial
> was suggested...another area yet undiscovered.


If I remember correctly, they are mentioned as one of the possible
ingredients in compost:

compost-msg       (35K)  3/27/01    A pickled food of fruits and vegetables.

http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/compost-msg.html

Since part of the idea of this dish seems to be that you added started

pickling with a few things and then added more items as the season
progressed and more items came into season, you could do this even if
you don't have the rest of the ingredients right now.


fruit-pears-msg   (19K) 10/11/99    Period pears and pear recipes.

http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-FRUITS/fruit-pears-msg.html
fruit-pies-msg    (45K)  1/ 5/01    Period fruit pies. Recipes. Baking pies.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/fruit-pies-msg.html

And there are various beverages as someone else mentioned:

perry-msg         (10K) 11/30/01    A cider made with pear juice.

http://www.florilegium.org/files/BEVERAGES/perry-msg.html
cordials-msg     (106K)  5/16/01    Period cordials and liqueurs. SCA creations.

http://www.florilegium.org/files/BEVERAGES/perry-msg.html


Maybe this one would work if you replaced the peaches with the pears?
Peach-Brandy-art  (12K) 10/25/01    "Peach Coriander Brandy" by Lady Constance
                                        de LaRose.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/BEVERAGES/Peach-Brandy-art.html

Or you could resort to modern methods and do some home canning:
canning-msg       (29K) 12/14/01    Use of canning in the SCA. Directions.

http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/canning-msg.html

--
THLord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
    Mark S. Harris            Austin, Texas          stefan at texas.net
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****