Poached Pears in Red Wine

These deliciously festive pears, tast fabulous served as a dessert.  Enjoy them as is, or heat and serve over vanilla ice cream.  Dice, and toss them into a fresh green salad (throw in a little crumbled goat cheese too), or add to raspberry jello (I substituted the syrup for the cold water).

If you're looking for a quick, elegant dessert, make a small batch and serve warm with ice cream and fresh whipped cream.

3 cups red wine3/4 cup sugar
4 pounds, ripe but firm pears
1/4 cup mulling spice

In a large skillet or dutch oven, heat the red wine, sugar and mulling spice until the sugar is dissolved.

Peel, halve, and core the pears. Lay the pears in a single layer in the red wine syrup.  Poach them over low heat for about 15 minutes.  Turn them over if needed, half-way thru the cooking time, making sure that each pear-half is stained red.  Remove from the skillet, and place in sterile mason jars.

Repeat until all pears are poached.  Pour the hot wine syrup over the pears inside the jars (leaving 1/2 inch head space), and seal with lids. Process in boiling water bath (15 minutes for pints - 25 minutes for quarts).

Eggnog Trifle

I love serving a trifle at Christmas to cap off our traditional English menu of roast prime rib of beef and Yorkshire pudding.  If we've a big crowd, I make enough to fill my footed trifle dish.  When there's only a few of us, I think its fun to serve individual trifles in pretty crystal or vintage glasses. I even have a few special child-friendly glasses for the children!

To add a bit of extra flare, sprinkle in a variety of berries (fresh or frozen).  Another fun idea I've run across, is to bake the cake in a 13 x 9 dish, then slice sections vertically to about 1 inch thickness.  Use a cookie cutter to cut enough cake shapes to line the outside of a large glass trifle dish.  Proceed with cubing and layering as directed.  The cut shapes look so pretty from the outside.

Ingredient amounts vary according to how many you'll be serving.  The following will make six individual trifles.

1 box vanilla pudding mix (the cheesecake pudding works well too)
2 cups eggnog
1/2 pint heavy whipping cream
powdered sugar to taste
2 - 3 cups fresh berries, or frozen berries, thawed and drained

1/2 recipe of Eggnog-Spice Bundt Cake (2 - 3 cups cubed cake)

port wine, sweet sherry, madeira, or apricot brandy

Prepare pudding according to package directions, using eggnog instead of milk. Place plastic wrap directly on the pudding, and set aside.





Beat the whipping cream until stiff.  Add powdered sugar to taste.




Traditionally, a trifle is made by first soaking the cake with a sweet liquor, and then layering as follows: cake, fruit, pudding and whipped cream.  Dividing the ingredients into more layers, makes a more interesting and better tasting overall dessert.  Be creative!


For the above trifles, I started with a dollop of whipped cream, a large berry, a dollop of pudding, a few cubes of cake - sprinkled with your choice of suggested liquor (omit for the kids) - a spoonful of berries, pudding, more berries, whipped cream, cake (sprinkled with liquor), pudding and whipped cream.  I finished each trifle off with a blueberry on top!

For the children in the family, I make alcohol-free trifles in special holiday glasses (plastic, in this case)!

Frosty, Pink Arctic Freeze

As festive as it is frosty!  

A good friend from Cleveland, gave me this festive recipe years ago, when my children were small.  It makes a lovely salad accompaniment to a holiday dinner, or serve it as dessert.  Either way, the kids will love it.

8 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
2 tablespoons sugar
1 can whole cranberry sauce
9 ounces crushed pineapple (I used a 15 oz can), drained
1 cup pecans, finely chopped (optional)
1/2 - 1  cup mini marshmallows
1 regular size container Cool Whip, thawed

Beat together the cream cheese, mayo and sugar.  Blend in the next four ingredients.  Fold in the Cool Whip.

Line a loaf pan (I use two small pans so I don't have to handle all at once) with large sheets of plastic wrap so the plastic drapes well over the outside of the pan.  Pat the mixture firmly into the corners of the loaf pan and level off the top.  Fold the wrap over the top (like a present).  Freeze overnight.  When ready to serve, carefully remove the frozen loaf from the pan by uncovering the top and pulling up on the plastic so the loaf slides out with the plastic (if you have trouble, quickly wipe the bottom and sides of the pan with a hot kitchen wash cloth, to loosen).

Remove plastic wrap and cut into 1/2 to 1 inch slices.  Serve on a lettuce leaf with a small dollop of whipped cream and a piece of maraschino cherry.

Old Fashioned Apple Crisp

With so many varieties of apples, how do you pick one for baking?  I like my apples to cook down so they're soft and juicy.  I don't like biting into a piece of apple, so I use a "cooking" apple like a McIntosh or Empire.  

I've never been a big fan of piecrust, but I adore the fresh fruit fillings.  I find myself substituting a crumbly topping for the top layer of pie dough all the time, so it figures I'd be a big fan of a good old fashioned crisp or cobbler.  This apple crisp is special because it has a hint of citrus, and isn't too sweet.  Rick likes it because the topping is truly crisp and stays that way for a few days afterward, if you have leftovers.

For citrus flavor, this recipe calls for the zest of an orange and lemon, plus a few tablespoons of fresh juice.  I'm going to take this opportunity to share my enthusiasm for my microplane.  With kitchen space at a premium, I never buy a gadget unless I'm sure I'm going to use it.  My microplane is well worth the space it takes inside my drawer.  I've found that if you turn it upside down while zesting, it's extra easy to collect and measure the zest right in the measuring spoon.  No mess, or scraped finger tips and knuckles.  I love it! 

5 pounds of good cooking apples
grated zest of 1 lemon
grated zest of 1 orange
2 T fresh orange juice
2 T fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg

Topping:
1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup oatmeal
1/2 pound (2 sticks) cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Butter an oval 9 x 14 x 2 inch baking dish.

Peel, core and slice apples.  Combine the apples, fruit zests, juices, sugar and spices.  Pour into the baking dish.

Combine the flour, sugars, salt, oatmeal and cold butter.  I used my food processor on the pulse setting but, you can also use a hand pastry mixer to combine.  The end result, should look crumbly.  Scatter this mixture evenly over the apples.

Place the baking dish (crisp) on a baking sheet (just in case there is a spill) and bake for one hour, or until the top is brown and the crisp is bubbly.  Always test to make sure the crumb topping in the center is fully cooked, not mushy.

I like to serve this warm, over a dish of vanilla ice cream, or with fresh cinnamon whipped cream.  Rick actually prefers his cold, or at room temperature, and unadorned.  Whichever way you serve it, you're gonna love it!