Pyrenean Sunset and Poached Pears
This was the fault of the sunset.
We were driving through Jurançon in early January, having just crossed the Pyrenees from Spain, when the light started doing that thing it does in winter, turning everything gold for about five minutes and making you believe you have plenty of time.
We didn't.
We pulled into Clos Thou in Jurançon about ten minutes before closing.
Ten minutes.
I have worked behind a wine counter. I know exactly what the person inside is thinking when someone walks in ten minutes before closing. You're mentally turning off the lights.
Thankfully, Julie Lapouble-Laplace was much nicer than I would have been.
We tasted. We talked. I remember Julie more than I remember the tasting room, which is probably the point.
And somewhere in there, Jurançon got my attention.
Not because I had never heard of it. I had. But there is a difference between knowing a wine exists and suddenly thinking, oh, I want to drink this.
And that was the beginning of it.
Photo credit: clos.thou
So, what exactly is Jurançon?
Jurançon comes from Béarn, in southwest France, right up against the foothills of the Pyrenees near Pau.
There are two styles you'll come across: Jurançon Sec, the dry wine, and Jurançon or Jurançon Moelleux, the sweet version.
The main grapes are Gros Manseng and Petit Manseng. Gros Manseng is generally the workhorse for the dry wines; Petit Manseng is the little grape that can hang around on the vine longer, shrivelling and concentrating its sugars for the sweet wines.
But sugar isn't the whole story.
What makes a good sweet Jurançon interesting is the acidity. You get all that honeyed, ripe fruit, but underneath it there is this juicy freshness keeping everything from turning into syrup.
Thank God for that.
Because I have a serious weakness for sweet wines.
I know sweet wines. Tokaji, from my home country, is probably the one I've drunk the most. Sauternes is another weakness. German Spätlese? Ja!
Give me a good sweet wine and I'm happy.
But I don't want sweetness for the sake of sweetness. I want the wine to have something going on underneath it.
Jurançon does.
Finding a bottle
I couldn't find Clos Thou in Calgary when I went looking for it this time, although I've bought their wines here before. No worries. Jurançon isn't exactly a one-producer region.
Just ask for the stuff.
And, because the name is not exactly intuitive, here's how to say it: zhoo-rahn-SOHN.
For the poached pears, I used a dry Jurançon. You could use the sweet wine, but honestly, why use the good stuff to cook a pear? The dry wine gives you the fruit, floral character and acidity, and you can add honey to control the sweetness yourself. That’s what I did.
And it also gave me an excuse to open the sweet Jurançon later!
The Dry Jurançon for poaching
The bottle I used for poaching the pears was “Juste le Blanc” a dry Jurançon made primarily from Gros Manseng by winemaker Charles Hours.
His estate, Clos Uroulat, is in Monein, where the vineyards sit on steep clay-limestone slopes looking toward the Pyrenees. Charles works with his daughter, Marie, and the estate makes both dry and sweet Jurançon.
And yes, the name made me smile.
Juste le Blanc.
Just the white.
If you’ve seen the French movie Le Dîner de cons, you’ll get the joke. The title roughly translates as The Dinner of Fools, although cons is definitely a little stronger than that. The whole premise is a dinner party where each guest brings along an idiot as their guest, basically to show off how clever they are.
The American remake was called Dinner for Schmucks. Because apparently the French weren’t allowed to have all the dinner-party disasters to themselves.
Sweet Jurançon for pairing
The sweet Jurançon is a different animal.
The late-harvested Petit Manseng grapes become intensely concentrated, giving the wine flavours of ripe pear, honey, stone fruit and sometimes citrus peel and spice.
It can be rich. Very rich.
But again, the acidity saves it.
That's what I like about these wines. You get the richness without the heaviness.
And suddenly I was thinking about dessert.
Specifically pears.
The bottles are only 375 ml, though, which is either very sensible portion control or a rather optimistic assessment of how much wine you intend to drink with dessert.
Pears, obviously
I had been making poached pears with red wine for years.
It's one of those desserts that looks much more impressive than it actually is. Peel some pears, pour in wine, add sugar and spices, and let the whole thing quietly happen on the stove.
The problem is that pears have a personality of their own.
One minute they're hard enough to break a tooth, and the next you've forgotten about them and they're collapsing in the fruit bowl.
So I had a few pears.
And I had Jurançon.
Naturally, I wondered what would happen.
Why use the good stuff to cook a pear?
Because why not?
I don't want Christmas potpourri. I want the wine.
So the recipe is deliberately restrained. Dry Jurançon, honey, a little vanilla, a little cinnamon and pears.
That's about it. No giant pile of spices trying to take over the kitchen.
The wine is the point.
Jurançon Wine-Poached Pears
Serves 6 | Prep time: 15 minutes | Cooking time: 35 minutes
Pears are either rock hard or suddenly plotting their own decomposition.
One minute they are hard enough to break a tooth, and the next you’ve forgotten about them and they are sitting in the fruit bowl looking like a small biological experiment. There seems to be about a twelve-minute window between not ready and too late. I don't always catch it.
Fortunately, pears get a lot more cooperative after a little time in wine.
Ingredients
750 ml white wine | one bottle*
6 ripe pears
150 g sugar | ¾ cup, or 100 g honey | ⅓ cup
1 cinnamon stick
Peel of ½ lemon
6-8 cloves
1-2 star anise, optional
½ vanilla bean, split lengthwise, optional
1 small piece fresh ginger, about 1 cm / ½ inch, thinly sliced, optional
*I used Jurançon Sec, a dry white wine from southwest France. It's fresh and floral, with plenty of citrus and enough acidity to keep the pears from becoming overly sweet.
But you absolutely don't need Jurançon. Any dry white wine will work: Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling, Chenin Blanc, Pinot Gris, whatever you happen to have around.
Even that bottle you bought with great optimism and then discovered was, frankly, undrinkable.
Actually, this is a pretty good job for it.
To serve
Vanilla ice cream - a no-brainer
Caramelized Walnuts - why not?
Jurançon Moelleux - obviously!
Instructions
Peel the pears, keeping the stems intact. Trim a little off the bottom of each pear so they can stand upright.
Place them snugly in a large saucepan. You don't want them swimming around too much.
Pour in the wine and add the sugar, cinnamon, lemon peel and any of the optional spices you're using.
Bring the poaching liquid to a gentle simmer. The pears should be mostly submerged.
Cover the surface with a piece of parchment paper and put the lid on the pot.
Simmer gently for about 30 minutes, turning the pears occasionally so they cook evenly. They're ready when a small, sharp knife slips easily into the bottom.
Don't let the liquid boil too hard. You want tender pears, not pear mush.
Carefully remove the pears from the liquid and let them cool slightly.
For a more concentrated syrup, pour some of the reserved poaching liquid into a small saucepan and simmer over medium heat until slightly reduced and glossy.
Let it cool slightly before serving.
To serve
Place each pear on a plate and spoon over a little of the syrup.
Finish with the walnuts, if using.
Add a scoop of good vanilla ice cream.
Serve chilled or just slightly cool.
And yes, there should be a glass of the same white wine beside it.
Preferably Jurançon Moelleux.
And that's how the pears happened
I suppose I could say the pears were inspired by Jurançon.
But really, it was that memory from the Pyrenean sunset, the bottle of wine we brought home, and then a bowl of pears that needed using.
One thing led to another.
The pears went into the wine. The wine went into the saucepan. And eventually another glass of Jurançon found its way onto the table et voilà!
Comments