Pear Bread

A funny thing happens when you're faced with a large pear tree and lots of really small pears. Yeah. You guessed it. You start baking things you've never ever tasted before. That's okay. I'm thrilled to have the pears. I love to eat them. More importantly, this particular tree got its start from my Gran's pear tree. The tree means a lot to me because it reminds me of the wonderful times spent at her house. Oh, and the bread's pretty good too!

Pear Bread

3 eggs

1 ½ cups sugar

¾ cup vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

4 cups peeled, cored, finely chopped pears

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Combine eggs, sugar, oil and vanilla. Mix well. Combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda and salt. Stir into the egg mixture just until moistened. Don't overblend because that will make it dry.
Toss pears with lemon juice. Stir pears and pecans into batter. The batter will be really thick.
Spoon the batter into two greased bread loaf pans. Bake at 350 degrees for 55-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks.

Pear Cake

There are many thoughts that cross a person's mind when she is staring at three buckets of pears. Desperation. Determination. And a frantic search for pear recipes.

Most folks immediately think of canning pears, especially the hard pears like we have. But why can something we're not going to eat? I could always make a cobbler. And I will before the pears are gone. But I really wanted to make a cake. I'd made a cake with apples. Why couldn't I make one with pears?

I didn't know how it would end up. But the entire kitchen smelled wonderful as it baked in the oven. I served it warm. Wonderful! Moist and delicious. Seconds, please!

Pear Cake

4 cups peeled, cored, chopped pears

2 cups white sugar

3 cups sifted all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

4 egg whites

2/3 cup Crisco oil

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Combine pears and sugar. Let stand one hour.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Coat 10-inch tube pan with PAM.

Slightly beat egg whites. Add oil, chopped pecans and pear mixture.

Combine flour, salt, baking soda, nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves. Add to the pear mixture. Pour batter into the tube pan.

Bake for one hour and 10 minutes. Remove from oven. Let cool on wire rack for 10 minutes before removing from pan.