Culinary Creativity
In honor of New Years (by which I really mean "having a day off,") I went across the state for a couple days to visit my friend and former roommate Julie. We were determined to relax, which involved putting together a puzzle, cleaning out an old trunk with some really cool stuff from as early as the 1870s, and making pear-pecan strudel. That particular bit turned out really well, so I'm going to share the recipe while I still have it memorized.
We had an actual cookbook that we were working out of, but I never did see the cover. We also altered the recipe a bit (i.e. substituting brown sugar for muscovado sugar) and doubled the portions. Doubling the recipe didn't actually double the work, and I feel like the amount of work wouldn't be worth it for the size of the finished product for the original recipe.
Ingredients:
Obviously, peel, core, and dice your pears. We found it was best to cut them fairly small. Heat the breadcrumbs in a pan until they're golden-brown. Combine pears, pecans, sugar and bread crumbs in a bowl, toss gently until the pears are covered and things are mixed pretty evenly.
Melt the margarine (recipe said stove, we said "microwave!") and dig out a pastry brush. With a doubled recipe, you're going to end up with what is basically two logs of phyllo with pear goop inside. So lay out two sheets of phyllo, brush them with butter, and spread a little of the filling on it. There should be a one-inch margin around the edge with no filling. Cover with another sheet of phyllo, brush with butter, scoop on filling. Wash, rinse, repeat, until either you have no more filling, or until you have just a few sheets of phyllo left.
This is the hard-slash-messy part, and it definitely helps to have two people. Or one person with three hands. Fold the short ends over on top of your last layer, then start rolling from one side of the long ends.
If you're like us, your bottom layer of phyllo will tear and the filling will start to escape. We solved this by quickly slapping down two more sheets of phyllo and rolling the disintegrating log up in them, transferring the whole thing to a waiting greased cookie sheet, and sticking down another couple sheets of phyllo on top to cover the joint. That seemed to work pretty well, so we did it with the second log, too. The whole thing was brushed with butter, the remaining sheets of phyllo crinkled on top, and brushed with more butter. The original recipe called for some ridiculous amount of honey drizzled over the top; that seemed excessive, so we just got out the honeybear and drizzled until it looked good.
Now, if you'll note, I put that you needed parchment paper in the list of ingredients, and then stated in my directions that our sheet was greased. This resulted in lots of baked-on caramelized gunk on the pan, so parchment paper was a, "well, if only we had..." sort of wistful afterthought.
These baked for only 25 minutes or so, though unfortunately I do not remember at what temperature. My method of baking pretty much anything involves setting the oven at approximately 350 and baking it until it looks good. With these, there's nothing in the filling that particularly needs to cook down (the pears were already soft, so you really just wanted to get them heated through, and there were no raw eggs or anything), so the point was more to get the dough looking lovely and golden than to make sure you weren't going to get botulism. I'd treat it like apple pie--if you're not sure, poke it from the side and see if the pears are done to your satisfaction. Adjust accordingly.
We decided these were really good with a little bit of cool whip. The flavor is really nice; quite mild, and delicately sweet. If you try it, let me know! I'd love to hear how yours come out. I post a recipe like...once every two years or so*, so I'm always interested to see if anyone experiments with them.
*Which is only slightly less often than when I actually cook something from scratch...
We had an actual cookbook that we were working out of, but I never did see the cover. We also altered the recipe a bit (i.e. substituting brown sugar for muscovado sugar) and doubled the portions. Doubling the recipe didn't actually double the work, and I feel like the amount of work wouldn't be worth it for the size of the finished product for the original recipe.
Ingredients:
- 4 pears, peeled, cored, and chopped.
- 2/3 cup pecans, chopped or ground (grinding was quicker!)
- 1/2 cup brown sugar.
- 2 cups bread crumbs (we toasted leftover challah rolls and used a food processor to make them into crumbs).
- 1 stick butter (we used margarine).
- 7 oz. phyllo dough (we used 8, because that's what came in the package).
- Honey...uh, to taste?
- Large-ish cookie sheet, covered with parchment paper.
Obviously, peel, core, and dice your pears. We found it was best to cut them fairly small. Heat the breadcrumbs in a pan until they're golden-brown. Combine pears, pecans, sugar and bread crumbs in a bowl, toss gently until the pears are covered and things are mixed pretty evenly.
Melt the margarine (recipe said stove, we said "microwave!") and dig out a pastry brush. With a doubled recipe, you're going to end up with what is basically two logs of phyllo with pear goop inside. So lay out two sheets of phyllo, brush them with butter, and spread a little of the filling on it. There should be a one-inch margin around the edge with no filling. Cover with another sheet of phyllo, brush with butter, scoop on filling. Wash, rinse, repeat, until either you have no more filling, or until you have just a few sheets of phyllo left.
This is the hard-slash-messy part, and it definitely helps to have two people. Or one person with three hands. Fold the short ends over on top of your last layer, then start rolling from one side of the long ends.
If you're like us, your bottom layer of phyllo will tear and the filling will start to escape. We solved this by quickly slapping down two more sheets of phyllo and rolling the disintegrating log up in them, transferring the whole thing to a waiting greased cookie sheet, and sticking down another couple sheets of phyllo on top to cover the joint. That seemed to work pretty well, so we did it with the second log, too. The whole thing was brushed with butter, the remaining sheets of phyllo crinkled on top, and brushed with more butter. The original recipe called for some ridiculous amount of honey drizzled over the top; that seemed excessive, so we just got out the honeybear and drizzled until it looked good.
Now, if you'll note, I put that you needed parchment paper in the list of ingredients, and then stated in my directions that our sheet was greased. This resulted in lots of baked-on caramelized gunk on the pan, so parchment paper was a, "well, if only we had..." sort of wistful afterthought.
These baked for only 25 minutes or so, though unfortunately I do not remember at what temperature. My method of baking pretty much anything involves setting the oven at approximately 350 and baking it until it looks good. With these, there's nothing in the filling that particularly needs to cook down (the pears were already soft, so you really just wanted to get them heated through, and there were no raw eggs or anything), so the point was more to get the dough looking lovely and golden than to make sure you weren't going to get botulism. I'd treat it like apple pie--if you're not sure, poke it from the side and see if the pears are done to your satisfaction. Adjust accordingly.
We decided these were really good with a little bit of cool whip. The flavor is really nice; quite mild, and delicately sweet. If you try it, let me know! I'd love to hear how yours come out. I post a recipe like...once every two years or so*, so I'm always interested to see if anyone experiments with them.
*Which is only slightly less often than when I actually cook something from scratch...