Pear, Apple, and Raspberry Crumble

Ingredients:

4 pears

1 apple

50 g rapeseed oil, plus extra

1 tsp lemon juice

55 g sugar, plus extra

1 tsp vanilla extract

5 tbsp oats

60 g flour

30 g almonds (ground or chopped)

30 g dark chocolate, optional

50-60 g raspberries (frozen is fine)

 

Instructions:

1. Wash, peel, and chop the pears and apple.

2. Lightly oil them and toss them with lemon juice and a little sugar. Bake at 190 C for 10-15 minutes, until softened.

3. Meanwhile, mix all the other ingredients together except the dark chocolate. Grate or chop the chocolate.

4. Top the fruit with the raspberries.

5. Dot the crumble topping over the fruit and sprinkle with chocolate (or mix the chocolate into the crumble topping first).

6. Bake at 190 C for 30-40 minutes.

Pear Crumble

I saw Nigel Slater’s recipe for pear crumble, but I changed it quite a bit, to suit our non-dairy diet and to make it even tastier (i.e. I added hazelnuts, but you can always use different nuts or just use more flour and oats instead).

 

Ingredients:

4 pears

50 g rapeseed oil, plus extra

1 tsp lemon juice

55 g sugar, plus extra

1 tsp vanilla extract

5 tbsp oats

60 g flour

30 g hazelnuts

30 g dark chocolate, optional

 

Instructions:

1. Wash, peel, and chop the pears.

2. Lightly oil them and toss them with lemon juice and a little sugar. Bake at 190 C for 10-15 minutes, until softened.

3. Meanwhile, mix all the other ingredients together except the dark chocolate. Grate or chop the chocolate.

4. Dot the crumble topping over the pears and sprinkle with chocolate (or mix the chocolate into the crumble topping first).

5. Bake at 190 C for 30-40 minutes.

Pear Cake

Some time ago, I discovered <a href="http://bravetart.com">BraveTart</a>, a fantastic dessert blog. This is the first dish I’ve made from it, but I’ve changed it from a <a href="http://bravetart.com/recipes/PearLayerCake">layer cake</a> to just a regular cake and I’ve adapted it to our tastes.

Ingredients:

about 550 g firm pears (about 3 pears)

2 eggs

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 pinch salt

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp cinnamon

½ tsp ginger

1½ cups sugar (200 g)

½ cup vegetable oil (about 115 g)

1¾ cups flour (about 170 g)

Instructions:

1. Peel and grate the pears, then squeeze out most of the juice. Save the juice.

2. Whisk the eggs, baking powder, baking soda, salt, vanilla, cinnamon, ginger, and sugar together.

3. Pour in the oil, still whisking.

4. Add the flour and the shredded pears. Mix.

5. Pour the batter into a greased tin. Bake at 200 C for 20-25 minutes.

6. You can pour some of the pear juice over the cake as a sort of topping, or heat it with sugar or honey into a sort of syrup, and then pour it over the cake.

Apple, Pear, and Mincemeat Tart

M liked the tart I made for her mum’s birthday so much that she requested it for her birthday too. This time I mixed it up by adding pears too.

Ingredients:

3 apples

oil

2 tbsp sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

2 pears

phyllo (also spelled filo) dough

½ jar mincemeat

Instructions:

1. Wash and slice the apples. You can also peel them if you prefer.

2. Fry them lightly in oil with the sugar and cinnamon, until a touch golden and caramelised.

3. Oil an oven-safe dish. Place two sheets of filo dough in it as the bottom.

4. Wash and chop the pears. Mix the apples, pears, and mincemeat on top of the dough. I used several layers of fruit and filo to make it a little nicer.

5. Top with a piece of dough and fold it all up like a parcel.

6. Bake at 200 C for about 20-25 minutes.

Pear and Fennel Tart

I saw a recipe in a magazine for mini pear tartlets with lime, chilli, and goat’s milk cheese. These were to be served as appetizers. I liked the concept but thought it would be nicer to make a heartier dish for dinner, so I decided I’d add fennel too. I thought the anise taste of the fennel could suit the other ingredients. I also caramelised the fennel and pear before baking the tart.

It’s an unusual flavour combination that worked together – tart, sweet, liquorice-y anise, tangy goat cheese – but because of the unusualness, it is not the kind of dish you’d want every week. I think it would be good as a starter for a dinner party. Apples can be used in place of the fennel, and then this would work as a dessert, too.

Ingredients:
1 package puff pastry
2 fennel
2 pears
butter
1 tbsp sugar or agave
1 lime
1 red chilli
200 g goat’s milk cheese

Instructions:
1. Roll out the pastry and place it on baking paper on a baking tray.
2. Dice the fennel and cook it in some butter over low heat in a frying pan.
3. Dice the pears. Add them to the pan, along with the sugar.
4. Grate the lime peel and add that plus the juice from the lime to the pan. Chop and de-seed the chilli and add that too.
5. Stir the ingredients and spread them on the puff pastry. Crumble the cheese over it.
6. Bake for 20 minutes at 200 C.

Parsnip and Pear Salad

Like a lot of food-lovers, I’m a recipe slut, and I’ll look for inspiration for new dishes anywhere, any time. This includes reading through the magazines and brochures that you can pick up at grocery stores and which generally seemed to be meant to sell the store’s products, plus are aimed at carnivores.

A few weeks ago, I picked one up and amidst all the advertisements for the store’s ready-prepared vegetable mixes and ready-made meals, I found a couple of potential recipes I could play with. One was for a salad of parsnips, chestnuts, pears, and walnuts.

Yes, pears and walnuts are a really good combination, but my girlfriend is allergic to walnuts, and a bit wary of other nuts as well. And I personally am ambivalent about chestnuts, and wasn’t eager to spend time roasting and peeling them. So as one often does with published recipes, I took the basic idea and adapted it to better suit our tastes.

The visual side of things isn’t usually my strong suit, but I placed alternating parsnip and pear slices in a sort of spiral on the plate, topped with crumbled blue cheese, and it didn’t look too bad. Also, I thought it tasted pretty good, although I served it after the parsnips and pears had cooled down, and next time I think it would better warm, possibly with a handful of pine nuts sprinkled on top as well.

Ingredients:
2 parsnips
olive oil
2 pears
butter
2 tsp sugar
baby spinach leaves or endive
stilton or other blue cheese
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tsp mustard
1 splash lemon juice
black pepper

Instructions:
1. Peel the parsnips and slice them into quarters or eighths lengthwise, depending on how thick they are.
2. Toss with oil and roast them for about 25 minutes at 200 C.
3. Quarter and de-seed the pears and then fry them in butter and sugar until softened and lightly browned, about 8-10 minutes.
4. Place the spinach on the plates and top with the parsnip and pear pieces.
5. Crumble the blue cheese over the parsnips and pears.
6. Mix the olive oil, vinegar, mustard, lemon juice, and black pepper into a dressing and dress the salad.