Sugar High Friday: Ginger  Add/Read Comments

Ginger Pears with Black Sesame Butter Crunch

Bloody cup measurements. How come it is so difficult converting them into usable metric quantities? This time overly generous with the butter resulted in the sesame crunches oozing oil when removed from the oven; but they drained nicely on a tea-towel and even gained some crunch on cooling. They were fine with the pears but this is the point where I discover that sesame seeds are not one of my favourite of flavours. If repeated I would replace with tuiles perhaps, or ginger snaps for a real spice hit.

The recipe was taken from The Wine Lovers Dessert Cookbook and served with a delicious Cape Promise Noble Late Harvest Muscat/Chenin Blanc from South Africa (Waitrose £8.99 half bottle). The cookbook suggested a late harvest Riesling but of course I couldn't find any!

To the pears - allow two pears per person for a generous person, so in this case four, peel and dice them and simmer in a pan for about 10 minutes with 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger (I also added some juice from a squeezed piece of ginger), a teaspoon of lemon zest, 2-3 teaspoons lemon juice, 1/4 cup (I added a big splash) of the dessert wine and 2-4 tablespoons granulated sugar. The cookbook has an optional addition of vanilla bean seeds but I added a little vanilla essence to some whipped cream and served that on top.

This months Sugar High Friday is hosted by Once Upon a Feast.