I’m not inherently cheap, but I do take pride in making a great meal for (and out of) next to nothing. It makes me feel crafty and creative. So I was particularly proud last week when I cooked a meal of champions for Chicky and I for less than $6 (slightly more if you add wine to the menu, which I suggest).
The menu: roasted root vegetables and a beef marrow bone.
Marrow bone: $1.75
Loaf of bread: $2
Beet: $1
Giant carrot: $1
A lot of people get squeamish about marrow, but to me it’s God’s gift, a secret part of the cow that few know about or appreciate. Area chefs are starting to bring it to the masses though: it’s on the menu at Eastern Standard and Toro. And for good reason: it’s cheap and delicious. As Chicky says, “It’s like meat butter.”
Roast marrow is simple to make at home… the hardest part will be finding a butcher who’ll slice the beef bone length-wise, giving you easy access to the marrow. If you can’t find one, opt for marrow bones cut cross-wise, about four inches long.
If you want to cook the above meal at home, remember that the veggies will take longer to cook than the marrow: Throw the bones in the oven when the veggies are just getting tender.
Roast marrow bone:
1 7-inch long beef bone, cut lengthwise
Sprinkle of sea salt
Loaf of crusty bread
Heat oven to 400 degrees. Set bones in a shallow baking pan, flat side up and sprinkle with sea salt. Roast 15 to 20 minutes, until the marrow is brown and soft, maybe a bit crusty on top. Be careful not to cook too long or the marrow will liquefy. Slather on bread. Mustard and pickles go well with it too.
A few weeks ago I mentioned that I was bringing home several pounds of pork products from North Carolina. A lot of people probably wonder why I’d bother lugging a bunch of random smoked pig parts that cost less $1.50 a pound across the eastern seaboard. The only answer I have is that they taste mighty good, and my local supermarkets seem to think the only parts of the pig worth eating are the chops, roast and ribs. Yes, I can find a ham hock here and there, perhaps even a pig’s ear… but we Yankee’s don’t seem to have mastered the art of smoking our swine the way they have down in Appalachia.
To me, these seemingly random parts hark back to a time when folks had to use the whole pig in order to make it through winter or to their next pay check. More than one southern grandmother has told me stories of a childhood that consisted largely of cornbread dipped in collards flavored with fatback, or whatever other part of the pig was handy. Chops and roasts were for the rich, but you could make a rich meal out of a bit of pork fat.
My 12 lbs of hog consisted of some smoked bacon ends and salted fat back. However, the vast majority of it came in the form of whole smoked pig jowls. For those of you who aren’t well versed in piggy anatomy, that would be the cheek, a lovely, fatty cut that’s akin to bacon, yet smoother (a result of the additional collagen found in a pig’s face).
Since falling in love with jowls, I’ve found that they have something of a cult following. The Atlantic wrote about them late last year and the internet raves about this recipe so much, I don’t think I’ll be able to resist trying it (yes, I’ll blog it).
I generally use the jowl in place of bacon, putting a touch of it into my caramelized onions, using it as flavoring in beef stew or to add a satisfying punch to veggies, beans and lentils. I keep them in the freezer a) because they last longer there and b) because frozen jowl is way easier to slice. Another plus: you cut your own jowl, and can decide if you want it thicker or thinner depending on what you’re making.
P.S.- if any of you readers know where to get smoked pork jowl in Boston, please pass it along, both for my sake and for that of the poor TSA people (and their dogs) who have to go through my bags when I fly from N.C.
Creamy lentils with pork jowl
1 small onion diced
3 oz smoked pork jowl diced
1/2 lb green lentils
2 c diced carrots
2 c red wine
3 c chicken stock (maybe more)
½ c light cream or half & half.
In a medium sauce pan sauté the pork jowl over medium-high heat until it starts to brown. Add onion and cook until translucent. Add lentils and carrot and stir around. Add red wine and stock. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until lentils are tender, about 25 to 30 minutes. If lentils soak up too much liquid, add more stock. Remove from heat and stir in cream. Serve immediately.
OK, so life didn’t exactly hand me lemons. Rather, sometime during the fall I got a bee in my bonnet about making limoncello. Chicky and I love the stuff- love it- and I’d read that it isn’t terribly hard to make.
My infatuation with this lusciously sweet digestif began on summer trip to Italy, where it’s icy presence made up for the country’s pervasive lack of air conditioning. Since then, I’ve been on a quest to find the best limoncello available in the U.S., perusing the liquor store’s in Boston’s North End and grilling bartenders and family members for reputable brands. Too often though, I’ve found that the limoncello here falls into two categories: gross or grossly pricey. I didn’t feel like I had much to lose by giving it a whirl myself.
However, the gap between setting my heart on making limoncello and actually doing it was rather large. You see, grain liquor and organic lemons aren’t easily found in Massachusetts. Grain liquor is illegal here- I ended up driving to Rhode Island and going to three liquor stores before I found it. And organic lemons… well, they’re kind of precious, i.e. expensive and hard to find.
A few people have inquired as to why I used organic lemons, when conventional ones are so easy to come by. Limoncello is made using the zest of the lemon- the yellow part. Unfortunately, that is also the part of the lemon that absorbs any pesticides that get sprayed and the idea of them leaching into my beverage was sort of scary to me. So I went organic.
I scoured the internet for recipes, and then because of circumstances and the fact that I can’t follow directions to save my life, kind of winged it. I finally found organic lemons at Whole Foods, but they looked like they’d been bullied by the other fruits… there was some serious bruising going on. But since they were all I could find, I decided to plunk down for them and simply avoid the bruised parts when I trimmed off the zest.
Once zested, I put the lemon peels and two liters of grain alcohol into my infuser. The grain alcohol really was something. First off, it was called “Graves Extra XXX Fine.” Second, the bottle came with a warning to keep it away from heat and flames. No wonder this stuff is illegal. Anyway, I left this lemon peel mixture to hang out for a month or so in a dark corner, as many sites recommended. However, I was perturbed one day when I came home to find that my entire apartment reeked of booze. Seems my infuser (basically a glass jat with a glass top) wasn’t airtight, and the alcohol was evaporating. In addition, when I tested the lemon peels, the snapped like a potato chip, and indication that they have infused all they can. But my mixture was hardly yellow… chalk it up to bad lemons.
About this time, I happened upon some lovely looking organic lemons at my local Shaw’s. So I decided to zest these (about a dozen smallish ones), add them to the remaining kind-of-infused liquor and add another bottle of grain alcohol (I’d bought three in Rhode Island, unsure of how much I’d need). I let this sit for about a month, again in my infuser, which I topped with plastic wrap to make airtight.
After a couple weeks, the mixture turned a deep, dark yellow, “Kind of like horse urine,” Chicky said. Mmmmm… yeah, exactly what you want to ingest, right?
At that point, Chicky and I got some cheesecloth and strained out the lemon zest (make sure to wet the cloth so it doesn’t absorb a bunch of booze). Then, I made a simple syrup of equal parts distilled water and sugar. Once cooled, I mixed it with equal parts of the infused lemon liquor. The result was a bright, but strong, limoncello. As my step-dad said, “It’s tasty, but there’s no doubt this stuff carries a kick.”
The whole process took about three months and cost me close to $90, about the equivalent of three bottles of good store bought stuff. So would I do it again? Absolutely! Now that I have a sense of what I’m doing, I want to perfect my recipe, maybe make an all-organic version, try one with oranges… I have visions of arriving at parties with the perfect hostess gift, of serving it ice-cold to friends at late-night summer gatherings on the roof deck and of finding the perfect little bottles to store it in. Warning to friends and family: this could become a years long experiment. Holler if you’d like to be a guinea pig.
As a rule, I don’t get too excited about holiday food. There are no real traditions in my family surrounding Christmas and New Years the way there are at Thanksgiving; we eat what we’re inspired to cook. One year that might be a leg of lamb, while the next it might be a whole pig or simply a roast chicken. You never know until you show up for dinner.
This year, however, new bars were set. My father turned 50 not long ago and his mid-life crisis has manifested itself in his culinary veins. While some men might have bought a fancy car or started working out, my dad installed a grill station. Set on the downstairs porch of our North Carolina house, the set-up allows my father to grill four sides of brisket while admiring the Appalachian mountains.
The set-up wasn’t entirely complete when we arrived here last week, but a guy came over on New Year’s Eve to install the grill so we could cook dinner. As soon as the last screw was turned, my dad was out there with Boston butts, pork shoulders and brisket. He cooked meat for eight hours, basting, rubbing and tasting all day and into the evening. The results were tremendous, though my dad has decided that his grill is too small. He wants a full-size smoker.
We had 36 for dinner and with our guests came a symphony of sides. Green bean casserole, carrot casserole, sausage and grit casserole, roasted squash and salad. This is one thing I love about the south. People here take pride in their cooking, passing recipes from one generation to the next, and on to one another at cocktail parties or just about any place else- remember that scene in Steel Magnolias where Truvy recites the cupa-cupa recipe in the beauty parlor?
As I prepare for my return north, I’m making a list of what southern delights to take back north with me. Stone ground grits, smoked pork jowls, bacon ends, maybe a smoked trout or some cheese straws if I can find ‘em. I’m also returning with a few recipes gleaned from some of the south’s better cooks: oyster pie, squash casserole, Russian tea, and some kind of dip made from corn and cream cheese.
I find Russian tea hilarious- I mean, really? Tang? I’d scoff at it if I hadn’t tried it and found it rather delicious.
Russian Tea
2 cups powdered Tang (or other orange-flavored drink mix)
2 cups white sugar
1/4 cup instant tea powder
3/4 cup lemon-flavored instant tea powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
In a large bowl, combine orange drink mix, sugar, tea powder, cinnamon and cloves. Mix well and store in an airtight container. To serve, put 3 teaspoons of mix in a mug. Stir in 1 cup boiling water. Adjust to taste.
One of the (few) perks about having divorced parents is that your holidays come in twos. Notwithstanding the delicate maneuvering of who’s and when’s, the actual enjoyment of two sets of gifts and two lovely meals is something to look forward to.
Christmas with my mom took place Saturday afternoon: a roast, winter vegetable au gratin, sautéed kale and mashed potatoes. For dessert, custard pie and (my contribution) caramel pudding. Chicky isn’t a big dessert person, so I really enjoy using these larger family gatherings to try out new recipes. For some reason, I was really drawn to the idea of a “Christmas” pudding, even though I know a traditional pudding would be a syrup-soaked cake, British style…
I was pretty excited when I found this recipe in Food & Wine as it uses 2 percent milk and was pretty simple to make (Though as with any milk-heavy recipe, watch that it doesn’t boil over… it’s a huge mess. And yes, I’m speaking from experience).
In just about 20 minutes, you’ll have a lovely thick pudding that’s got just a hint of saltiness to it… top with a nut brittle or fresh whipped cream and you’ll be singing carols all night.
Creamy Caramel Pudding
(from Food & Wine)
1 quart 2 percent milk
1/4 c. plus 3 Tb cornstarch
2 tsp vanilla
2 c. sugar
1/4 c. plus 2 Tb water
pinch salt
In a small bowl whisk 1/2 cup of milk with cornstarch, vanilla and salt.
In a large sauce pan combine sugar and water. Cook over moderately high heat, undisturbed, until a deep caramel forms, about 8 minutes.
Remove from heat, whisk in 3 1/2 cups of milk, a quarter-cup at a time. Whisk over moderate heat until caramel has dissolved. Simmer until mixture thickens, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat.
Gradually stir in cornstarch. Cook over moderate heat until pudding is very thick- about one minute.
Put into ramekins and chill two hours. Serves 6-8, depending on the appetites of your crowd.
Oh baby! Back from D.C. and it is COLD- soup weather is here. As a matter of fact, I’ve managed to eat soup at least once a day (and sometimes twice) everyday this week.
While it’s certainly nice to come home to a pot that’s been simmering all day, I don’t always have the foresight or the time to make that happen. So I was thrilled on Sunday when I went to my friend Emily’s house for dinner and she served a spicy tortilla- tomato soup that’s delicious and dead easy to make. It was so good that I gave it a whirl the next day on my own stove. Seriously, 15 minutes is all you need for this.
(*I hope that readers will forgive the lack of multi-media here. I have yet to take a photo of soup that doesn’t come out looking like some kind of gruel. I suppose I could have made a video of me making soup… but like I said, I sometimes lack foresight.)
Tortilla Soup
(adapted from Emily)
½ small onion, diced
Good glug of olive oil
4 to 6 corn tortillas, broken up into small pieces
4 to 6 cups chicken stock, depending on what kind of broth ratio you like
1 can tomatoes and green chiles (RO*TEL or the store brand… doesn’t matter.)
1 avocado (optional)
Heat olive oil in a sauce pan and add onions. Sauté until they become translucent and add the tortillas. Mix well. Add chicken stock and tomatoes. Bring to a boil and simmer 10 minutes. Serve in a bowl, garnished with chunks of avocado.
Sometimes, maybe it’s better just not to know.
I’m in D.C. this week, visiting friends and doing some job looking. Of course, that means that I’m also in proximity to one of my all-time favorite sandwich shops: Potbelly’s.
Disclaimer: Cold cuts are generally one of the three things that I refuse to eat, along with papaya and tuna from a can. Potbelly’s is the exception to that rule.
I fell in love with them back when I was in college, where the sandwich chain enjoyed something of a cult following partly due to the fact they were founded in nearby Chicago. Their shop in Evanston was high on the list of favorites- cheap, filling and generally good for a hangover. The turkey sandwich always did it for me- served on a homemade wheat roll, topped with provolone cheese and sent through an oven so it got all melty and crispy. To this day, I have a hard time ordering anything else. And don’t even get me started on the chocolate chip oatmeal cookies or hand-dipped milk shakes…
Of course, there is no Potbelly’s in Boston, which makes it a big treat when I’m near one, which is the case this week. But somehow, I’d always regarded turkey and provolone on whole wheat as something healthy- kind of an un-guilty pleasure. That is, until today when I decided to look up their nutritional information. That “healthy” turkey sandwich? Try 646 calories and 27 grams of fat. I would have eaten less had I gone to McDonald’s for a 6-piece chicken nugget and a small fry (510 calories and 29 grams of fat). The fact that I now know one of those oatmeal cookies has 450 calories may preclude me from ever ordering another.
Yes, I know I’m being ridiculous. I know that I could save calories by foregoing mayonnaise and cheese and that overall, I’m probably getting more nutrients and fiber in my sandwich than I would out of a McMeal… but I can’t help but be thankful that Potbelly’s is a rare treat and not an everyday temptation.
Summer may be the season of bounty, but for me Thanksgiving marks the unofficial start of the cooking season. What better way to pass those days when it’s too cold to leave home than to cook some long and complicated recipe you’ve been dying to try? It just might be the best way to look productive while still wearing your pajamas.
Anyway, to date most of my cooking fantasies simply been dancing around my head like sugarplum fairies. However, this year Chicky put the kibosh on any holiday recipe ideas that veered from the very same Thanksgiving dinner that my mom (and her mom before her) has been making for 25 years. No roasted brussels sprouts, cornbread stuffing or smokes salmon hors d’oeuvres…
I scored a mini-coup with my chocolate pecan pie and the addition of a grown-up version of green bean casserole. My mom and step-dad are crazy about green bean casserole- it makes an appearance on her dinner table at least once a week, complete with canned soup and those strange fried onions that appear to have only one use (anyone else know what to do with those onions?).
A few years back I read a story about “Grown Up Green Bean Casserole” and for obvious reasons, it stuck with me. After getting the go-ahead from the family, I scoured the internet for recipes, and settled on this beauty from Cook’s Illustrated, which I doubled with no trouble. The recipe says it serves six to eight, though seven people nearly polished off a double batch at Thanksgiving… take that for what it’s worth.
“Grown Up Green Bean Casserole”
(from Cook’s Illustrated)
2 quarts water
1 tablespoon table salt
1 pound fresh green beans, ends snapped, snapped into bite-size pieces
For the sauce:
8 ounces baby portabella mushrooms (I got the pre-sliced ones)
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon fresh garlic, minced
1 teaspoon kosher salt or to taste
Generous grind of fresh pepper or to taste
1 1/2 tablespoons flour
3/4 cup chicken stock
1 tablespoon dry sherry
3/4 cup half & half or heavy cream (don’t use fat-free half-n-half; it won’t thicken)
Salt & pepper to taste
Topping:
2 slices good whole grain bread
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
2.8 ounce can of French fried onions
1/4 teaspoon table salt
1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Bring the water to boil in a large pot. While it comes to a boil, add the salt and beans to the boiling water. Cover and cook for 6 minutes or until crisp-tender and still bright green. (Be sure to cook the beans to your desired level of doneness; from here on, they will reheat but won’t cook more.) Drain beans in a colander, then plunge into ice water to stop the cooking. Drain a bit in the colander again.
Clean the mushrooms; break off and discard the stems (though I used them and thought they tasted fine). Chop into pieces. Melt the butter in a skillet. Add the mushrooms, garlic, salt and pepper. Stirring often, cook until mushrooms begin to soften and exude their liquid, about 6 minutes. Stir in flour and cook a minute. Add the chicken stock and sherry; bring to a simmer. Add the half & half, simmer until sauce thickens, about 10 – 15 minutes. Taste and adjust the seasonings. Stir into the cooked beans.
In the food processor, process the bread, butter and seasonings in about 10 quick pulses. Stir in the onions — but don’t process. If making ahead, transfer to a storage container and refrigerate.
TO BAKE RIGHT AWAY Preheat oven to 425F. Transfer hot bean mixture to a greased quiche pan or baking dish. Top beans with topping and bake uncovered for 15 minutes.
TO BAKE LATER Transfer bean mixture to a greased quiche pan or baking dish, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate. Return to room temperature. Remove plastic wrap. Heat in 425F oven uncovered for about 10 – 40 minutes until hot and bubbly. (Ten minutes is enough for a shallow dish like a quiche pan. Allow more time for a deeper dish.) Add topping and bake for another 15 minutes.
OK, so it’s been so long since I last posted that I wondered if I should even bother… but the fact is I haven’t been doing much foodie type stuff lately. Instead, life has been consumed with looking for jobs and (though you’d never guess from this blog) counting calories…
Anyway, a few things I have been up to:
- Travels. Headed to Portland a couple weeks ago on something of a food pilgrimage. Had an Allagash White and a meatloaf sandwich at Duck Fat, which is high on my list of all-time favorites. Stopped by Two Fat Cats for cookies, which I’d read were supposed to be the best, but I found kind of meh, just a bit too crisp for my taste. And I spent well over an hour inside Rabelais Books, one of the few stores in the nation dedicated solely to books on food.
Though I’d read the NY Times article and visited their blog, I wasn’t sure what to expect at Rabelais. I envisioned a cross between a Williams Sonoma and a Borders, and I’m glad I was wrong. The store was a bit smaller than I thought it would be, lined with book shelves and filled in with book covered tables. The place maintained a good balance of older (ie used) and new books, and was full of all sorts of little treasures, like books on foraging for mushrooms or dressing game, and first editions of several cooking classics. I pawed through a first-edition “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” ($1,500!) and discovered the folks from River Cottage, who put together a fine book on fish (A particular interest, as you might have noticed).
After a lot of hemming and hawing (I am unemployed, after all) I chose a little book for some vegetarian friends and approached the counter to pay. On top was an old Fannie Farmer cook book. “God, I covet these,” I said to the woman working. A brief conversation about our grandmother’s beloved cookbooks ensued. “I have a few extras here that the owner said I could give away at my discretion,” she said, picking up a stack of old Fannie Farmer’s. “Pick one out, if you like.”
Incredulous, I looked through the pile, which included a few books from the 1920s and earlier. Some of the spines were broken, some had loose pages. None were in sell-able condition. But there was one from 1917 that was mostly intact, seemingly with all its pages and enough stains on the cover to ensure it had been well-loved. “Really?” I asked. “Take it,” the woman replied. And that is how I came to have my very own “Boston Cooking School Cook Book.”
- Notable meals. Yes, there have been a few, on both ends of the spectrum. I had a birthday recently, which gave someone a good excuse to take me out for a fancy meal. We headed to Moo, which I couldn’t have been happier about. I’m the first to admit that I’m not a steakhouse kind of girl. But my companion isn’t really a gourmet kind of guy. And for us, Moo was perfect. For starters, it doesn’t feel like a steak house. The inside is cool and hip, more South Beach than Boston and the menu, while beef focused, has a lot of other stuff to offer.
We started with steak tartare, which came with warm pita crisps and a quail egg on top. I love raw beef, but after getting food posioning a few years ago, I’ve largely shied away from it… However, beef being Moo’s specialty, I figured I was safe. And I was right. It was soooo good, I filled up and couldn’t finish my entree. Dinner was Beef Wellington and a smorgasborg of sides: squash, mashed potatoes, truffled fries, creamed spinach and brussel sprouts. Yes, we took quite a doggie bag home. The service was impeccable, just exactly what it should have been with a waiter who helped us choose a lovely wine and brought us a plate of homemade s’mores with candles in them. This will go on the list of “Best Meals 2009.” Yes, I keep track of things like that.
If Moo was one of the best meals of the year, Estragon provided one of the worst. I cannot tell you how disappointed I am to say this because with its funky decor and great wine list, I really wanted to make it a favorite. But the bottom line is they served me bad meat. Twice. But more on that in a sec.
Chicky and I headed there earlier this week on a whim. At first glance, everything seemed great. our server suggested a wonderful bottle of wine and the menu appeared to be creative, with lots of the stranger cuts of meat that Chicky and I treasure. But any excitement evaporated when the food arrived. The veggies were ok, but the two meat dishes we ordered were awful. Awful. At first, I thought that maybe it was me, maybe I just don’t like beef cheeks or something (I know I don’t like liver or tongue). But a quick consultation to higher culinary powers confirmed that no, beef cheeks are not supposed to taste “gamey.”
“It tastes like old meat,” Chicky said. And she was exactly right. Both of our meat dishes smelled like that hamburger that’s been sitting in your fridge for two weeks. We tried to be nice, yet honest when our server asked how the food was, but he didn’t pick up on it. Instead, he stood at our table and talked very quickly at us for 25 minutes about Provincetown while not very discreetly wiping his nose on his sleeve. If the whole kitchen was as high as this guy, it’s easy to see why the food sucked. We sent back more than half of it untouched and while the wine was good, I wish I hadn’t paid $87 for this experience.
- Cooking. Now that it’s fall, I have occasion to make some of my favorite things: soups and pies. Made an “everything but the kitchen sink” lentil soup last week that was supreme. Onions, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, celery and kale. So yummy, and with all those veggies, you know it’s good for you.
- I was late getting into the Thanksgiving cooking spirit. But I’ve got it pretty good now. Just finished making a chocolate-pecan pie and will tackle “Grown Up Green Bean Casserole” tomorrow. The pie looks really really good… and smells about the same. If I was smarter, I would have made two pies and then had one to taste today… but as it stands now, the taste-jury will be out until tomorrow. I used a Gourmet recipe for “Waiting for Wilma” pie and then adapted it to what was in my own cupboard.
My version:
1 9-inch frozen pie crust. (Sorry, but pie crust isn’t delicious enough to warrant making my own)
1/2 cup dark corn syrup
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
1 Tablespoon pure vanilla extract
1 Tablespoon Pusser’s dark rum
1/4 teaspoon salt
3.5 oz milk chocolate, melted (in my case, a giant Cadbury Dairy Milk bar)
1 1/4 cups pecans, finely chopped
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix together corn syrup, sugar, eggs, flour, butter, vanilla, rum, cocoa and salt until combined. Stir in melted chocolate and pecans and pour into pie shell. Bake until top is puffed but slightly wobbly in center, about 50 minutes. Serve at room temperature.
I had a moment of serendipity earlier this month when I was at a party and the host mentioned this really cool pear tree he had in his back yard.
“Help yourself,” he said, and so, with Cake and Commerce’s October canning challenge in mind, I did. I had the perfect plan in mind: pear butter.
The internet proved to be both a blessing and a curse in my quest for perfect pear butter. While it provided some alternative recipes, it also provided some contrary advice as to how my pears should be cooked. Should I core and peel my pears first, or take advantage of the pectin contained there? How many pears should I use? Should I push the mixture through a sieve or blend it in a food processor?
In the end, I used about six pounds of pears, and keeping in mind my pectin problem of the previous month, decided to cook the pears with their skins and cores, to maximize my chances of a good set. I cut the pears into quarters and set them in a large pot, with about three cups of sweet white wine, and cooked then until the pears were mushy enough that I could remove the core with a spoon. I then cut the cores from the pears, returned them to the pot and added two cups of sugar and a cinnamon stick. I let that cook until it was the consistency of apple sauce and then put the mixture through a food processor to smooth it out. Then, I cooked the mixture until it had reduced by half- a couple of hours.
The pears were then ladled into pint jars and processed. One is waiting to be given to my friend with the pear tree.
Pear Crostini
12 slices French bread
1 pear, thinly sliced
Gorgonzola cheese
Pear butter
Toast bread until golden and spread generously with pear butter. Sprinkle with gorgonzola and top with a pear slice. Return to oven and cook until cheese is just melted.
