Why do my pears go from rock hard to mushy overnight?

Every other tree fruit is picked when it is ready to eat. Pears are not: left on the tree they become gritty and brown-hearted, and the window between hard and mush is famously a matter of hours. The technique that solves it is entirely simple — pick early, chill, then warm a few at a time — and it turns pears from a lottery into a reliable, long-running supply.

Step by step

1. Pick pears firm, and earlier than feels right.Lift the fruit so the stalk swings towards horizontal and twist gently. If it separates, it is ready to pick. It will still be hard, and that is correct.
2. Go over the tree several times.Pears on one tree do not all part at once. Check every few days through the picking period and take only what lifts easily.
3. Store them cool for the waiting period.Early varieties such as Williams' Bon Chrétien need only a few days to a couple of weeks. Conference keeps for a month or two. Late varieties such as Comice and Concorde can be held for two to three months at 0–4°C before ripening.
4. Bring only a few into the warm at a time.Move a handful into a room at normal temperature for anything from two days to a week depending on variety. This is what lets you eat pears over months instead of all in one week.
5. Test at the neck, not the belly.Press gently with your thumb just below the stalk. When the flesh there gives slightly, the pear is ready — that day or the next. The wide part of the fruit is soft only once it is past its best.
6. Watch the skin colour on varieties that change.Many pears lighten from deep green towards yellow-green as they approach readiness. Conference stays fairly green, which is why the neck test matters more.
7. Speed it up with ethylene if you need to.A ripe banana or apple in a paper bag with the pears releases ethylene and brings them on in a day or two. Useful when you have misjudged it for a meal.
8. Refrigerate them once they are ripe.A ripe pear holds for a few days in the fridge and only a day at room temperature. Ripen a few, chill them, and start the next few.
9. Use the ones that got away.Over-ripe pears are excellent poached, in a crumble, in chutney or puréed and frozen. A pear that has gone soft is not wasted.

Tips

• Conference is the most forgiving pear there is, which is why it is everywhere. Comice is the best-tasting and the least forgiving.
• Pears left to ripen on the tree develop a brown, gritty core while still feeling firm outside — cut a windfall open and you will see it.
• A cool garage in October is a good enough pear store. A fridge is better for late varieties you want to hold until Christmas.
• Perry pears and old cooking pears are a different thing entirely and are meant to be hard.

Common mistakes

• Waiting for pears to soften on the tree — They ripen from the core outward. By the time the outside gives, the middle is brown and gritty.
• Bringing the whole crop into the warm at once — They all ripen together and most of them go over. Ripen a handful at a time and keep the rest cool.
• Judging ripeness by squeezing the widest part — By the time the belly is soft the fruit is past it. Press just below the stalk instead.
• Storing pears in a warm kitchen — They ripen immediately and unpredictably. The store needs to be cold; the ripening happens in the warm, deliberately.

Questions people ask