Pear Sauce

Update: You can now view my video tutorial on my YouTube channel, My Modern Homestead:

https://youtu.be/0W0Rh10WMnU

Have I mentioned how much I love canning?  Just in case, today's post is dedicated to the sweet, full-textured pear.  :)  My neighbor gave me two plastic grocery bags full of pears over the weekend, so yesterday's canning marathon included pear sauce.  I have the best neighbor!!  I love cinnamon apple sauce, so the idea of pear sauce totally had me at hello!  Pear sauce is not simple and quick, so be prepared to spend a day at home to get it all in.  I highly recommend a rainy day with a cup of mocha!

To begin, wash and rinse your pears really well.

Aren't they so pretty?

The next step can be done two different ways.  If you have a food mill, remove both ends of the pears.  Cut the smaller pears in half and the larger pears in quarters.  Don't remove the skins or cores.  If you don't have a food mill, you will want to peel, cut, and core your pears (The cores and peels can be boiled to make juice for pear jelly).

Place the pears in a large pot of cold water sprinkled with Fruit Fresh as they are cut.  Having a cute little helper is always fun.

Next, put the pears on the stove to cook slowly.

This was my second time doing pear sauce.  With this batch,
I wanted to also have enough juice with which to make jelly,
so I made sure to have plenty of water.   

This is what my pears looked like as they cooked when I made sauce without a food mill.

I kept just enough water in the pan to keep them from burning.  I also threw
in a few splashes of lemon juice.

Once the pears were soft, it was time to turn them into sauce.  There are different ways to turn the pears into sauce.  If you have a food mill, remove the pears from the water and run the pears through the mill.  Save the water if you plan to make jelly with it!  The end product is your pear sauce.  If it is too runny, it can be cooked slowly a little while longer to your desired thickness.

If you don't have a food mill and have peeled and cored your pears, you can use an immersion blender to process the pears, or you can run the pears through a food processor, returning them to the pan when done.

Once the pears are processed into sauce, they can be prepared to your taste.  I added sugar and cinnamon to mine.  I cooked the sauce for a little longer to make sure the sugar was fully dissolved.

Next, the sauce was ladled into hot, clean jars leaving 1/2 inch head space.  The rims were wiped clean, and the jars were sealed with two piece lids.  The jars were then processed.  Pints should be processed for 20 minutes and quarts for 25 minutes in a water bath.  

Viola!  Beautiful jars of pear sauce!  What do you like to add to your sauce?  I would love any great ideas!

Tomorrow, I will share how I turned the cooking water into pear jelly!

Until we meet again, may you be blessed!

*Always follow safety guidelines from the USDA to ensure safety of canned products.