Amish Pear Butter Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Why is my pear butter not thickening? ›

Water is the reason your apple pear butter isn't getting thick. As with most things in life, we can't control how much water our apples and pears contain when we pick them. Depending on how much water is in the fruits, your apple pear butter may take a bit longer to thicken.

Do I need to peel the pears? You can make this recipe with either canned pears, which require no prep (you just need to drain them), or you can use fresh. If using fresh core them and cut them into chunks. You don't have to peel fresh pears as we do blend them after cooking to get a smooth butter.

At this point, you may either can the pear butter, or simply let it cool to room temperature and store it in the refrigerator for up to 2 months. If you plan to store the pear butter outside of a refrigerator, follow proper canning procedures.

Leaving the skin on the pears is not an issue and usually comes down to personal preference. With the skins on, the canned pears can become a bit tough and turn an off-color in the jar, so I prefer to remove them.

Sometimes the ambient temperature can be too warm or the friction of the churning and shaking process can create some warmth. Find the coolest place in the house to leave the cream to culture.

“Any conditions which tend to harden the butter-fat will require a comparatively high churning temperature; and any conditions tending to soften the butter-fat will require a lowering of the churning temperature.”

Why is my pear butter gritty? The gritty texture in pears is caused by stone cells. The more mature the pears are, the more stone cells they develop. The stone cells are completely safe to eat, but not the most appetizing.

How do you keep cut pears from turning brown? Dip the slices in a mixture of 50% water and 50% lemon juice. The acidity from the lemon juice stops the fruit from oxidising, leading to less browning over time. Plus, it will keep them tasty, too!

Like other butters, it's a good idea to keep it refrigerated so it lasts longer. However, you can keep a week's worth of butter on your counter in a butter dish without risking spoilage. With a butter crock, it may last at cool room temperature even longer.

Just-picked or purchased pears should be ripened at room temperature. On the counter is fine, but keep unripened pears out of the 'fridge. Once ripe, you can store pears in the refrigerator. The cold temperatures will slow the ripening process and they'll keep for 3 to 5 days.

Why butter should not be refrigerated? ›

Salted Butter

The USDA's FoodKeeper app offers this guidance for storing butter: "May be left at room temperature for one to two days; one to two months when stored in refrigerator; six to nine months if stored frozen." After that, the taste can turn rancid or sour, says the USDA.

When purified procyanidins were treated at 95 °C at three different pH values (2.7, 3.3, and 4.0), procyanidin concentrations decreased after treatment, the more so as the pH was lower, and a pinkish color also appeared, attributed to tannin-anthocyanidin pigment.

Although pears are most often canned in simple syrup, it is quite safe to can them in juice or even plain water. The canning liquid is a flavoring element, not a safety consideration. There are two basic ways to safely can pears: the hot pack method and the raw pack method.

This type of very firm pear is also one that can be candied whole - If you dip the pear into boiling water for a minute, it makes it much easier to peel and you can remove the core from the bottom - a metal potato peeler works for the little fruits, an apple corer is too big. Leave the stem attached.

Sadly, sugar plays a huge role in set. If you cut the amount in the recipe and you don't compensate with a pectin designed for low sugar preserving, your jam may well be runny. Did you check for set while the jam was cooking? Any time a recipe gives you a cooking time, it's simply an approximation.

If there isn't enough pectin in the fruit itself and you don't add extra pectin, the result is runny jelly or jam. Additionally, if the fruit is overripe, its pectin levels are lower. Added pectin comes in a couple of forms. You can find powdered pectin and liquid pectin at grocery stores and online.

Just keep cooking, as alilja and Golly suggest. Mix a small amount of corn flour with some water if it's already cooled and keep mixing until it thickens. This is a bad idea if you are expecting your apple butter to keep for more than a week.

Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to maintain a lively simmer and cook, mashing the fruit and stirring occasionally at first and then often as it thickens, until the mixture is very thick, 20 minutes to 1 hour (depending on the type of fruit). To test doneness, put a spoonful of fruit butter on a plate.