Rosie Cooks At Maxine's.

The Hawthornes took a weekend trip. Mr. Hawthorne dropped me off at Maxine's in Danville and he went on to see his mother for her birthday.

Saturday night, we had a mixed greens salad with poached pears, blue cheese, and toasted walnuts.

Poaching liquid: 1 cup red wine 1/2 cup sugar 1 TB lemon juice 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1 tsp vanilla Mix all together and bring to boil, stirring to dissolve. Reduce heat to simmer and add peeled, cored, and halved pears. I threw caution to the wind here and added a sprinkling of ground cloves over the pears. Cook 10 minutes, spooning liquid over pears occasionally. Turn pears over and cook additional 10 minutes. Turn heat off and let pears cool in poaching liquid. When cooled, remove pears from liquid and reduce liquid down by half. Now when I say "reduce liquid by half," I don't mean for you to pour out half the liquid. I mean for you to gently simmer the liquid until it is reduced by half.

For the poaching liquid, I added 1/2 cup sugar to 1 cup red wine.

Added in a tablespoon of lemon juice.

Vanilla in.

Cinnamon in.

I liked this shot of the cinnamon. I brought this to a boil, stirring occasionally to dissolve. Reduce to a simmer.

I peeled, cored, and halved my pears and added them to my simmering poaching liquid, giving the pears a sprinkling of ground cloves.

After ten minutes, turn the pears over for another ten minutes. I let the pears cool in the poaching liquid, which, by the way, was delightful.

Remove pears from liquid.

Simmer poaching liquid until reduced by half. The flavor intensifies. Oh, this is good.

It gets nice and syrupy.

You want it to coat the back of a spoon.

I crumbled some bleu cheese in the cored section and ran the pears under the broiler until the cheese was bubbly.

Mixed greens salad with balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil. Poached pears with melted bleu cheese and reduced syrup. Toasted walnuts.

Oh, yes. I'll be making these pears again.