Pears — season, tips, and recipes in New Zealand
Pears is a fruit available in New Zealand during February, March, April, May, June, July, peaking in March, April, May. This page is a practical guide for home cooks: when to buy pears, how to pick a good one, how to store it, what it goes well with, three original recipes, and detailed nutrition information.
Nashi pears (Asian pears) are also grown in NZ, mainly in Hawke's Bay. They're eaten crisp like an apple, not soft like a European pear.
How to pick a good one
Buy firm, ripen on bench. Check the neck: gentle give near the stem = ready. Don't wait for the whole fruit to soften.
How to store it
Ripen at room temperature, then refrigerate. Only last a couple of days once ripe.
Goes well with
blue cheese: Blue cheese's saltiness and funk is aggressive enough to overwhelm most things. Pear's gentle sweetness moderates it without eliminating the character. The fat in the cheese also carries pear's subtle aroma better than most things.
walnut: Tannins in walnut skin and pear's gentle acidity complement each other. The textural contrast matters as much as flavour -- pear's softness and walnut's crunch create a combination that's interesting to eat.
ginger: Pear's delicacy means strong flavours can overwhelm it. Ginger is one of the few sharp flavours it can handle because ginger's heat is warm rather than cold or acid.
honey: Pear and honey share similar floral aromatic compounds. They reinforce rather than contrast with each other, which produces something more intensely pear-flavoured than pear alone.
Recipes
Pear & Blue Cheese Salad
Classic autumn salad.
Ingredients: 2 pears, 80g blue cheese, handful walnuts, 2 handfuls rocket, 1 tbsp olive oil, 1 tbsp honey, squeeze lemon
Method: Thinly slice pears. Arrange over rocket. Crumble blue cheese. Scatter walnuts. Dress with oil, honey, lemon.
Poached Pears in Red Wine
Looks like a restaurant dessert.
Ingredients: 4 pears (peeled whole), 500ml red wine, 100g sugar, 1 cinnamon stick, 2 cloves, strip orange peel
Method: Dissolve sugar in wine with spices. Add pears. Simmer gently 25 min, turning occasionally. Remove pears. Reduce liquid to a syrup. Pour over pears.
Pear & Ginger Cake
Moist, spiced, keeps well.
Ingredients: 2 pears, 125g butter, 150g brown sugar, 2 eggs, 200g flour, 2 tsp ground ginger, 1 tsp baking powder, 100ml milk
Method: Cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggs. Fold in flour, ginger, baking powder. Stir in milk. Dice one pear into batter. Pour into tin. Slice remaining pear on top. Bake 170C for 45 min.
Nutrition
One medium pear provides 6g of fibre (24% of daily needs), more than most fruit. Most of the fibre is in the skin. Also provides 12% of your daily vitamin C and 10% of vitamin K. About 100 calories. A single pear has more fibre than a bowl of bran cereal.