I often get asked where my inspiration for raw food recipes comes from. This raw food dessert is based on a dish that I had years ago. It was a pear that was poached in red wine and topped with whipping cream and pistachos. I never forgot that dessert. Recreating it in raw food form wasn’t difficult and the results are sublime!
Make sure you have fresh ripe pears and the rest is easy.
Pears with Pistachio Cream and Cacao
Pistachio Cream
- 1/2 cup raw pistachios, soaked overnight, drained, rinsed
- 1/2 cup raw cashews, soaked overnight, drained, rinsed
- 1/2 cup coconut oil, melted
- 2 tablespoons agave
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
1. Remove any skins that might remain on the pistachios after soaking.
2. Place all ingredients in high-speed blender, blend until smooth.
3. Refrigerate until firm.
Chocolate Ganache
- 1/4 cup cacao powder
- 1/4 cup agave
- 2 tablespoons coconut oil, melted
1. Whisk all ingredients together to make the ganache.
Assembly
- 2 pears
- 1/4 cup pistachios, chopped
- pistachio cream
- ganache
1. Cut and core pears.
2. Place on plate and spoon pistacho cream into pears.
3. Top with ganache and chopped pistachios.
Serves 4.
{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
My eyes nearly jumped out of my head when I saw this! Red pears and pistachio are two of my favorite flavors and they sound wonderful together. This is so elegant and simple. You could serve this to anyone and they wouldn’t be thinking about the fact that it’s raw, only that it’s gorgeous!
This looks RAWMAZING!!!
Thanks for sharing.
It looks super delicious. Now if you can come up with an alternative to 1/2 cup of coconut oil I would be all over it
Elena, I am confused. Don’t you have a whole video on your site about how you love tropical traditions coconut oil?
Beautiful–looks like a party in my mouth is about to happen. I will make mine with carob–we don’t do raw chocolate.
Thanks so much for another excellent and beautiful recipe!
Peace & Raw Health,
Elizabeth
OH MY!!
Since the original was poached do you think putting the pears in the EX (dehydrator) for a few hours to soften would work? Did you by any chance try that and it didn’t work? (cuz I am sure you probably thought of it)
Oh my gosh, no! If you get ripe pears, they are delicious as they are. I wouldn’t do anything different to them. I think it would actually take away from the recipe.
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!
Looks delicious!
In response to Elana’s concern about coconut oil; I have nothing against coconut oil, but I also use Irish Moss for congealing things. I soak the moss overnight, rinse very well, then Vitamix it with just enough water to form a paste. I then use the paste to gel things up. I may try this recipe and split it in half, adding coconut oil to half and then Irish Moss to the other half to see how they turn out. Irish Moss is loaded with healthy minerals also. For those of us still needing to watch out for too much fat (calories) the moss is a great ingredient to use. Note: I usually freeze this Irish Moss Paste into cubes (for convenience), it can also be refrigerated up to 1 week also.
In response to Elana’s concern about coconut oil; I have nothing against coconut oil, but I also use Irish Moss for congealing things. I soak the moss overnight, rinse very well, then Vitamix it with just enough water to form a paste. I then use the paste to gel things up. I may try this recipe and split it in half, adding coconut oil to half and then Irish Moss to the other half to see how they turn out. Irish Moss is loaded with healthy minerals also. For those of us still needing to watch out for too much fat (calories) the moss is a great ingredient to use. Note: I usually freeze this Irish Moss Paste into cubes (for convenience), it can be refrigerated up to 1 week also.
What a wonderful dessert idea for Valentine’s Day! It looks yummy and I cannot wait to try it… THANKS!
Beautiful presentation and love the use of pistachios.
I LOVE this gorgeous recipe !!
Susan,
Where do you get your raw almond, pistachio and macadamia nuts? Are they reasonable?
I am lucky enough to get truly raw almonds locally. Other things I order on line. I would suggest doing a search.
Mmmmm! This looks wonderful! I will try this next week on my days off.
Gail this is for you………
I cannot find Irish Moss where I live, is there somewhere to order it from.
Thanks….:):)
Hello, I am just wondering how you feel about using agave, I have been doing a lot of reading on it and have read some really concerning things, my local organic cafe has switched to palm sugar instead, how do you feel about it?
I do not feel that all agave is bad. There are dramatic differences in the product. You can read more here: http://www.rawmazing.com/articles/agave-hero-or-villain/ One very positive thing about agave is that it usually takes 1/4 of it to get the same sweetening that other products require, which I see as a positive attribute.
For raw almonds go to http://www.california-almonds.com. They have a great selection of raw almonds.
There are raw agave products available Oh!gave Raw is process at under 118 degrees. You can find it on amazon.com and Whole Foods. Info at http://ohgave.com
I am new to preparing raw foods so I took a leap of faith and prepared the above recipe. The really cool thing is I made it for a friend who is a big time baker and makes amazing meals so I told her this was an experiment and that it was part of my new raw food program. She was blown away by how good it was and so was her husband so this is a big compliment coming from people who I would consider (cooked/baked) food lovers! Thanks for sharing the recipe and I am sure to prepare it again. (I also loved it – it was nice and light too).
I just came across your site. Your food looks beautiful! I am excited to try all these yummy recipes.
I’m going to be teaching a raw food class this summer and would love to add this recipe to my menu!
I made this recipe for my friend and my daughter the other night and they absolutely loved it. The cream is just beautiful and oh so yummy. Of course, mine didn’t look like yours. I globbed it onto the pear with gusto! Lol
This was wonderful. The flavors complement each other so well! The second time, I substituted coconut cream for the coconut oil, which resulted in a much fluffier and less oily pistachio cream.