Poached Pears and Chimichurri Steak

This afternoon I had some free time and decided to make red wine poached pears. For dinner my family threw together a quick and easy chimichurri sauce and marinaded some steaks.

A poached pear with lots of homemade whipped cream.

My poached pears were not the most beautiful, and the whipped cream was added in massive globs instead of perfectly piped peaks, but I am still very proud. I think they're a yummy and pretty easy to make dessert that sounds quite impressive. If you want to follow the recipe I used you should look at Dini from The Flavor Bender's recipe.

I made some adjustments and did a few steps differently, so I will note the differences below.

Ingredient differences:

Swapped piece of orange peel for an entire clementine peel.

Used cinnamon powder (I couldn't find my cinnamon sticks.)

Added a dash of almond extract.

Direction differences:

To get a more flavourful product, I don't strain the liquid like Step 3 says to. Once I have the pears in the liquid, I poach them for about 10 minutes each side, and let the liquid bubble up around the pears rather than keep them on a gentle simmer. I've used a few different techniques to submerge the pears, but the easiest is to tilt them so a third to a half are in the liquid at one time. When they're done poaching, I usually take the pears out, cook the sauce down to a syrup, drizzle the syrup on the pears, then finally cool the pears and syrup in a sealed Tupperware container.

I like to keep the pears in the syrup to marinate while they cool completely. By dessert time, they will be super flavourful! While a lot of autumnal spices are used, I find the refreshing and cool flavour of the fruit is well suited to spring or summer.

For the whipped cream I use:

1/2 pint (8 oz) of heavy cream

One heaping tablespoon of granulated sugar

Splash or two of vanilla extract

Then I whip it on medium to high until the cream has soft peaks. An easy way to test for soft peaks is by dipping the whisk in and seeing if pulling it out slowly leaves a little peak. If you have a hard time telling if it is ready, just taste it. It is a much fresher, richer flavour than canned cream.

And finally, that quick steak meal.

Normally there would be a picture here, but I forgot to take a photo, so you'll have to trust me that it looked delicious.

My family does not like cilantro, so my mum and I made a basil and spinach chimichurri sauce. For the most part we followed a recipe from Sarah's Cucina Bella because my mum and I haven't made chimichurri before.

Changed we made:

More garlic (follow your heart)

Squeeze of lemon

2-5 leaves of fresh parsley

A handful of fresh basil

A few handfuls of spinach for colour, flavour, and to add some hidden veggies.

We mostly eyeball the amounts used, but adding some spinach and lemon to Sarah's recipe should get you similar results.

We tossed all of the ingredients in a food processor (but added spinach a little bit at a time) until it was a lovely green with similarly sized bits of herbs and spinach. We marinated the steak for about half an hour. My mother cooked the steaks in a skillet for 5-10 minutes per side depending on how well we wanted our steaks and their thickness. Once they were browned on the outside and just between red and pink inside, we sliced the meat and served it.

Chimichurri steak pairs well with a nice salad, my family opted for Caesar, and some Jersey corn. It is early in the corn season, but my mother always picks out the sweetest pieces by looking for small, white or very light yellow kernels.

I like to take my time, so I spent about an hour on the pears, but if you don't put on a mini concert in the kitchen, it could take 30-45 minutes. The steak should marinade for a while, but the actually labour takes 20 minutes.

I'm not really sure if this post is about recipes or just my love for cooking, but I hope you enjoyed reading about my dinner. I also hope your meals were extra yummy today and you enjoyed the long weekend.

Cheers for now!