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Polpo's Poached Pears. Perfect


We have now had these pears a couple of times. On Saturday we did the whole dish for Grandma Betty’s birthday and it went down very well.
Firstly it’s great to be able to use seasonal British pears, secondly, as with everything we have cooked from this book this is very easy to do and a great dish to prepare ahead of time if you are cooking for a bit of a crowd.
I should declare now that I didn't cook the meringues (or indeed the pears) my own personal meringue girl Mrs. Cook did so and did so beautifully.


Recipe for 6 people

Ingredients
8 medium free-range egg whites – at room temperature
650g caster sugar
250ml white wine
6 firm pears – comice are perfect
pinch of saffron
200ml whipping cream

Method
Preheat the oven to 130°C/Gas 1/2 and line two baking sheets with baking parchment paper. Tip the egg whites into a large clean mixing bowl (not plastic). Beat them with an electric hand-whisk on medium speed until the mixture resembles a fluffy cloud and stands up in stiff peaks when the blades are lifted.
Now turn the speed up and start to add 450g of the caster sugar, a little at a time. Continue beating for 3–4 seconds between each addition of sugar.
It's important to add the sugar slowly at this stage as it helps prevent the meringue from weeping later. When ready, the mixture should be thick and glossy.
Stick down the edges of the paper with a little leftover mixture – this is to prevent the parchment lifting when baking. You can either dollop the meringue mixture into shallow 'nests' with a spoon or transfer your mixture to a piping bag and pipe down a thin base in a coil, working out from the centre and then up around the outside to build a more even, round 'nest'. Make 6 of these. Bake for about 1 1/2 hours until the meringues sound crisp when tapped underneath. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.
Bring 1.5 litres of water, the wine and the remaining 200g sugar to the boil in a large saucepan. Turn the heat down to medium and leave the liquid bubbling while you peel the pears, remembering to leave the stalks intact. Put the pears into the saucepan with the pinch of saffron and simmer on a very low heat for approximately 1 hour or until the pears are soft when pierced with a knife. Remove from the heat and allow the pears to cool. Boil the liquid to reduce it to a thicker syrup.
When the pears are cool, carefully remove the cores using a corer and quarter them.
Keep them in the syrup and turn your attentions to the meringue. You can do this ahead of time - we made them the day before.

Lightly whip the cream until it has a fluffy consistency. Now place a meringue onto each plate using a little whipped cream on the base to hold them in place. Dollop a large tablespoon of cream onto each meringue and then place the pears on top with a little of the syrup.
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