Help me identify pears
I moved into a new home about nine months ago. We have a pear tree, and amazingly, there are pears growing on it.
They are fairly small, about the size of a tennis ball (maybe even a bit smaller), bright green and they develop a rusty-colored blush on them. The flowers were white when the tree bloomed.
Does anyone have any idea of what kind of pears I have? Are they edible? What can I do with them? Do they ripen off the tree, because they are hard as rocks and never soften before falling off.
By QueenB
on Jun 6, 2007 06:43 AM
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I'm wondering if your tree is an ornamental Bradford Pear. I have two in my front garden. The white flowers bloom in early spring here, north of Boston MA. Then after about 3-ish weeks very small fruit appeaars. These are NOT edible, but some species of birds like then.
This variety is a hybrid of the Callery pear, which you could research as well. Hope this helps.
I found a link for you to compare with your tree: http://tinyurl.com/yuh6ee
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Thanks Gio, but that's not it.
These pears are actually pear-shaped, not round and the leaves definitely don't look like that.
I'll take some pictures when I get home from work today and post them.
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Sounds like what we in Canada refer to as a sugar pear. They are not great for eating out of hand but are great when poached in a syrup with white wine cinnamon and cloves.
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Ok, here are the pictures, one of the tree and one of a pear. You can see the pear is only 2" from top to bottom.
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Possibly a Seckel pear. Their size gives them away. Usually 2" in size.
Image ---> http://www.vegiworks.com/seckel.jpg
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Possibly a Seckel, sugar, or California sugar.
http://www.foodsubs.com/Pears.html
http://www.usapears.com/pears/varieti...
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Thanks Cheese Boy and hannaone. It's good to know what I've got.
I made the mistake last night of biting into an unripe one. Sucked all of the saliva right out of my mouth. I think I need to let them sit for a few days. Bet they'd be good in pear butter!
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Or maybe once off vine and ripened some, in a pear tarte!
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My understanding of pears in general is that they are one of the few fruits that is properly ripened off the tree, the others being avocados and bananas.
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yes, you are correct, pears ripen off the tree.
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I bought an old farmhouse that had an ancient pear tree. No idea what variety it was so I used my grandmother's old recipes for what she called "cookin' pears." She used to poach them in sugar syrup with cinnamon. Then I branched out to relish recipes and tried them with cranberries when they showed up in markets. Tried them with wine.
The ones on my tree weren't seckel pears but they were good in all sorts of recipes. They never got soft. They were great for cooking and maintained a nice texture in recipes.
Pears don't ripen on trees by the way. They're picked and stored to allow them to ripen.
You could take a small branch from the tree and some of the fruit to the local office of the State Agricultural Extension Service. They might be able to identify it.
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