Elderberry season seems to have come quickly this year, even by Texas standards. I found a stand that I identified last year, past season, and already about half of the berries had fallen. This is now my second good source, as I already had an enormous tree right in my neighborhood.
Fruit heads 8-10" across. |
Theoretically, this can deminish yield, and smaller sized fruit, but, well just look at it! Each branch was heavily laden with fruit and many of the pears were enormous! Honestly, I had difficulty finding "medium" sized pears for this recipe.
Pears that have not been sprayed for insects have thicker, more bitter skins than pears that have. The pear thickens its skin in response to insect activity. So naturally, with pears that need to be peeled in one hand, and a crap ton of elderberries in the other, my mind went to poached pears.
I like to poach pears to remain firm after cooking, for this reason I harvest them slightly underripe. Also, most recipes say to remove the elderberries from their stems by running a fork through them like a comb. I end up with a hot mess when I try this, so instead I simply use my fingers, gently. It may take a bit longer but it's not that bad.
Nutritionally, this dish is super good for you, especially when you consider what's usually in a dessert. For each half-pear serving, with 1/6 of the sauce, you have about 135 calories, a ton of antioxidants and about half your daily vitamin C.
Pears poached in elderberries with warm spices
Makes six servings or 3 large servings
- 2 cups of elderberries (about 5 large heads of berries)
- 3 medium sized pears, peeled, tops and bottoms removed, cut in half lengthwise
- 4 green cardamom pods, smashed to open
- 1 cup of water
- 1/4 cup red wine or 2 tbs. bourbon
- 2 tbs. brown sugar or honey
- 1 tbs. aged balsamic vinegar
- 1 tps. ground cinnamon
- 1/2 tps. ground cloves
- 1/4 tps. ground allspice
- 1 star anise
- Zest of one medium lemon
- 1 tbs. corn starch
I mixed 1/2 cup fat free plain and 1/2 fat free vanilla greek yogurt and ate as a brunch! |
Notes of caution when eating elderberries
- Be sure of your identification. People have mistaken deadly plants for elder.
- Only harvest flowers or berries, all other parts of the plant are poisonous.
- Only pick dead ripe and black (or blue, on the blue elder bush) berries. Underripe berries are partially poisonous as well.
- Only eat elderberries if you've cooked them well, the seeds contain toxins which must be destroyed with heat.
- Do not eat elder if you have the following medical conditions: diabetes (can interfere with medicine), cancer on chemotherapy (can interfere with treatment), autoimmune diseases (can aggravate symptoms and/or interfere with treatments) or if you are on laxatives or diuretics (can enhance the effects of both for dangerous dehydration) or Theophylline or other bronchodilators.
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