Caramel Poached Pears with Chocolate Filling

Ingredients

For the pears:

• 4 pears (you can make more or less, you just might have to adjust amounts of ganache and caramel)

• 2 tbsp coconut sugar

• 1 cinnamon stick

• 1 lemon

• 1/4 tsp fresh ground nutmeg

• 1/4 tsp allspice

• 1/4 tsp ground cloves

• 1/8 tsp dried orange peel

For the ganache filling:

• 1/2 cup dairy free dark chocolate chopped

• 2 tbsp full-fat coconut milk

OR use my refined sugar free chocolate sauce recipe

For the caramel:

Use my refined sugar free caramel sauce recipe

For the crunchy topping:

• 2 tbsp rolled oats

• 2 tbsp chopped walnuts

• 1 tbsp of your caramel sauce mixed with 1-2 tsp water

Method:

1. Make your caramel sauce and set aside for later.

2. Fill a medium to large pot with water and place it on the stove over medium heat. Stir in coconut sugar, cinnamon stick, juice from 1/2 lemon, nutmeg, allspice, cloves, and orange peel.

3. While that is warming up, rinse and skin your pears. Using an apple corer, remove the middle of each pear. This is a little tricky because you want to keep the stems in. What I do is go about halfway up the middle of the pear with the apple corer and give it a few twists. Pull out the corer (the core will still be inside the pear but you will have a ring around it with no pear). Using a knife, gently go in at an angle towards the core all the way around so that the core comes out. Cut off the ends of each core (bottom of the pear) and save for later.

4. As you are working on your pears, squeeze a bit of lemon juice so that the pears don't brown.

5. When you have cored all the pears, place them in the spice bath and let them poach until softened-about 40 minutes or so. You can check if they are done by gently sticking a fork or knife into a pear, if it comes out easily your pears are done.

6. While your pears are poaching, get your ganache ready. Add your chocolate and coconut milk to a double-boiler over medium-low heat. Melt until smooth and creamy. Set aside and allow to thicken up at room temperature.

7. Remove pears with a slotted spoon. Allow to cool 5 minutes before piping chocolate ganache into the middle of each pear. Use the nubs of the core to seal the pears after they get the chocolate filling.

8. To make the topping, simply toast oats and walnuts in a non-stick pan (no oil!) over a medium-high heat until the walnuts become fragrant. Turn down the heat just a smidge and pour in the diluted caramel. Mix together for a few minutes and remove from the heat.

9. To serve, warm up your caramel and pour it over the pears. Sprinkle with your crunchy topping and enjoy :)