I have multiple bushels of Kieffer pears that are starting to fall. I’m not sure what to do with them. I’ve made pear sauce from some pears before that I thought was better than any apple sauce I had made, but then other times I’ve wound up with grit floating in juice that wasn’t any good at all. What types of pears make good pear sauce? And what types for pears are good for canned quartered wedges in syrup? And should I age these pears at all before I process them? They’re only mildly sweet now. Will they sweeten in storage? Kieffers wouldn’t be good as dried fruit, would they? I like Asian pears a lot dehydrated. Any other recommendations?
Dehydrating would be a great use of them. You may want to let them sweeten up some beforehand so you can give them a dip in lemon water before drying. Sorry, I have yet to can pears so I can’t give you any knowledge based feedback there.
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I haven’t had much luck getting the old style kieffer to sweeten up in storage.
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For as long as I can remember Kieffer has been used for canned preserves. Served on hot cat head biscuits.
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Dehydrated is a good idea. Another choice is to make pear wine, or pear cider. Mark (markalbob) gave me a bottle of pear wine he made awhile ago which was very good
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I made dried, sweet cinnamon pears one year That were really good. They were Kieffers from a friend’s tree. I made a light simple syrup, added a bit a cinnamon, and just lightly cooked the pears in that, maybe 5 min. Drained, then dehydrated. I think I also tried just shaking the slices in cinnamon sugar and that also turned out well. They were a great sweet snack. Here’s a link that might help:
https://nchfp.uga.edu/publications/uga/uga_dry_fruit.pdf
Don’t Kieffers benefit from cold storage, then back to room temp to help ripen and soften them?
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I don’t know, but I was thinking that might be true, so that’s what I’ve done with pretty much all my Kieffers for the meantime. I’ll try to remember to report back on the results.
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Pear Cider
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Back in the 80s, when potato guns were a thing, I would say use them as backup ammo for a potato gun!
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Bein’ as how I’ve never had a kieffer and have never made kimchee, I’m obviously fully qualified to suggest using them that way … I mean, why not?
;-)M
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If a person was caught using a kieffer in a potato gun fight, I suspect the opponent might cry foul for using ammo that’s too hard! I shouldn’t bash on kieffers, partly because I might break my hammer, but also because they do have some good uses. Just not for dessert.
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Shot a lot of turnips back then 
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I haven’t tried processing them in any way, but the Keiffers I’ve kept in my fridge for a few weeks have become much sweeter than they were when I harvested them. They’re still pretty hard, but it hasn’t put any of us off eating them fresh. Maybe if I took them out of the fridge for a while they would soften up. I didn’t have high expectations of Keiffers for fresh eating, but we’ve enjoyed them after a little cold storage. Our favorite pear this year has been Shin Li - some have been massive, almost grapefruit size, and very sweet.
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Hi there…I’ve been out quite awhile, this was just a bleh year for many reasons, but I will say that as Annie mentioned I have made pear wine several times, and it can produce a surprisingly good chardonnay-esque wine
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My wife made some sweet pickles from a few crisp kieffers. Not bad!
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I needed to use the fridge they were in for something else, so I took them out about a week ago. I did make a small batch of pear sauce with the ones that looked like they weren’t going to keep as well. It was pretty good, but I’ve had better (that other people have made.) In the meantime, a lot of the smaller pears and pears with stink bug damage that I just left on the tree are still hanging just fine, so I wonder if I harvested mine too early. I harvested mine over a month ago because a bunch had already fallen off on the ground, but maybe that was premature drop, not a sign of them being ready as I took it to be.
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Can I get some Shin Li scions. Grafting some Bradford pears.
I used my Kieffer’s to make pear butter with.
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Getting into mid-October here in Zone 6 my Kieffers are still rock hard on the tree. I pick them and lay them out on the garage floor. Generally after a few more weeks they are still hard, so I refrigerate them a few more weeks. Then, ready or not, hard or a bit softer I slice or halve and can them, very simply in light syrup (1 parts sugar to 2 parts water). The flavor is as good as any of the “better” pears.
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