Easy Fudgy Poached Pears Desert

I wanted to make a special desert (not just packaged cookies or ice cream) for my DH the other day but I had very little time to put into it (so no baking). I used a recipe from Rachael Ray which turned out really well...and kinda pretty too!


Isn't the dish funny? I love these - they were my grandmother's banana split dishes. Who knew they even made a dish for that purpose?! Anyway, I was pretty surprised how easy the recipe was to make and how good it tasted for only having a handful of ingredients. This isn't one you'll want to make for health reasons, but it was delicious, quick and special , which fit the bill for the night!

Easy Fudgy Poached Pears

This literally took 20 minutes tops and almost no work at all! Rachael says it serves 4, but we're cafoni, so hubs and I had no problem eating the whole thing!

• 2 cans pears in heavy syrup, 15 ounces
• 4 tablespoons amaretto or dark rum
• 4 ounces bittersweet chocolate chips or, chop up a bar
• 1 pint ice cream

1. Open cans of pears, and drain syrup into a small saucepan. Reduce the syrup (boil, stirring over med-high heat) for 15 minutes or so. At the end, at the liquor and continue heating another minute or two (or you could pull it off the heat and add extract of almond or amaretto flavouring if you don't have liquor). Stir in the chocolate until it's melted - the thick syrup will make it fudgy!

2. Slice up the pears into dishes and pour the chocolate over top. Top with ice cream. Rachael suggests french vanilla - I used chunky monkey, I think.

**Note that pear IN HEAVY SYRUP are necessary for the success of the fudgy sauce - if they're in juice it won't thicken up right.

**You can probably use milk chocolate chips too if you don't have dark or bittersweet (though I strongly suggest you stick to the darker chocolate - it goes really well with the pears). I used semi-sweet baking chocolate squares.