Spiced Red Wine Poached Pears
Elegant, and simple.
These wine poached pears were first inspired by the wine poached pears I ate on my 24th birthday at the Warszawa restaurant in Santa Monica, CA. Coming from a (very) Polish family, Polish food in general has always found itself as a comfort food and constant reminder of home. While I have never been to Poland, I have had more than enough dumplings and pierogis in my lifetime.. and it shows.
What you need
2 cups dry red wine, such as cabernet or merlot
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup cinnamon
Pear halves (canned or cut)
Lemon zest (No more than a couple tablespoons worth)
Directions
Bring the 2 cups of red wine to a boil in a medium sized sauce pan. Add more red wine as necessary to make sure that the pear halves will float properly.
Once boiling, add the 1/2 cup of sugar and stir it in; ensuring that all the sugar dissolves and melts into the mixture properly. Additionally add half of your cinnamon in now.
Once that has been brought to a boil and all the ingredients are well blended, add the pear halves one by one and set a timer for 8 minutes for the first side.
Once those 8 minutes have passed you will now want to add some lemon zest on top and flip the halves over. Reset the timer for another 8 minutes and add the rest of the cinnamon.
Continue to alternate sides for a couple of minutes at a time after the 8 minutes have lapsed. The pears should be soft enough to poke a fork through with little resistance, but not quite mushy.’
Once the pears have reached the optimal consistency, take them out and allow for them to cool in a bowl for roughly 10 minutes. This will allow for the extra wine to run off the pears.
Once cooled, serve with a fresh scoop of vanilla bean gelato.
Bonus
Once the pears have been removed from the sauce pan, bring the sauce pan back to a boil to allow the mixture of wine, sugar, zest and cinnamon to thicken a bit over the heat. Add 1/4 cup of sugar as necessary to thicken it – depending on your preferences. Serve a spoonful over the pears and gelato to add a syrup or to simply garnish the plating.