Poached Pears

I haven't posted in a while, but I'm going to play catch-up now and post a couple things. Also, I'm going to be adding the recipes to my posts so that any one else can try as well.

This is something I had been wanting to try for a while and I feel that it turned out well.

The recipe calls for:
5 cups of water (enough to cover the pears)
2 1/2 cups of granulated sugar
2 Lemons (for zest and juice)
1 Vanilla bean (I just used about 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract)
4 Pears (Bosc or Anjou)

Add the water, sugar, lemon zest, and vanilla bean/extract in a medium sauce pan and bring it up to a boil.

While the liquid is heating up, you can go ahead and peel the pears. (One tip is to cut the lemons in half and rub the lemon juice onto the pear after peeling so that the pear doesn't turn brown.) You will also want to cut a slice off the bottom of the pear about 1/8 inch thick so that the pear will be able to stand up.

Once the pears are peeled, drop them into the boiling water and reduce it to a simmer. (You can also squeeze the remaining lemon juice into the water for a stronger lemon flavor, which I like.) Cook the pears until they are fork tender, around half an hour. Remove the pan from the heat and let it cool to room temperature, then you can move it to the refrigerator and chill.

It was pretty tasty. If I'm going to try this again, I think I'm going to try out a different syrup with it. Not that this one was bad, but just to try different things.