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Last year, during the height of my soda-making obsession, I first discovered the beauty of the quince. I was experimenting with a new flavor profile (quince and star anise), and after a few hours of simmering, I was left with a delicious soda syrup and melt-in-your-mouth Poached Quince. After just one bite, I knew I had stumbled upon a new seasonal favorite. In its raw form, quince is quite inedible. Sour and astringent, raw quince looks like an apple or a pear, but seriously… don’t take a bite. When cooked, quince transforms into a wonderfully fragrant delicacy nothing short of pure heaven. The fragrance is like apple and pear mixed with heady floral notes. In this recipe, I’ve added vanilla, cardamom and ginger to the poaching liquid. Each of those flavors compliments the quince; however, you can omit any or all of them if you’re not a fan. Quince are ripe when firm, yellow and fragrant. Continue reading for the recipe.
After peeling quince, you’re left with an off-white fruit that browns easily. Be sure to get the prepped fruit in the poaching liquid as soon as possible to avoid discoloration. When cooked, the fruit takes on a beautiful blushing pink. This pink will deepen in color as the days go on.
Poached Quince can be enjoyed for breakfast, dessert or as a sweet snack. I love to slice and pair with vanilla ice cream or tart Greek yogurt. Drizzle the poaching liquid over top or use as a soda syrup.
Poached Quince
Ingredients
- 7 cups water
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup honey
- 1 lemon, cut in half
- 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
- 5 green cardamom pods
- 6 slices of peeled fresh ginger
- 6 large quince
Instructions
- In a large pot, combine water, sugar, honey, lemon, vanilla, cardamom and ginger. Bring mixture to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve sugar.
- While the mixture is coming to a boil, peel, quarter and core each quince. As you finish prepping each quince, add quarters to the pot with the poaching liquid. When exposed to air, peeled quince can turn brown quickly, so get them into the water right away.
- Cut a round of parchment paper the size as your pot. Also cut a small hole in the middle of the parchment round. Once you've added all quarters to the pot, cover with the parchment round.
- As soon as the mixture comes to a boil, drop heat to low and simmer until the quince are knife-tender. To test, insert the tip of a knife into one of the quarters. If it meets no resistance, they are done. This can take 1 to 1.5 hours.
Store poached quince in their liquid in the refrigerator for 1 to 2 weeks.
Related links and recipes:
There’s a new taste for quince
Got Quince? Make Quince Paste!
Quince Recipes by Nigel Slater
Sweet and savory ways to use the quintessential quince
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I’m Brandon: food explorer, recipe curator, cocktail shaker, dessert lover. Kitchen Konfidence is how I document my time spent in my favorite space, the kitchen. Did you make a recipe? Tag @brandiego on Instagram so I can see the how it went!
ahu says
this looks beautiful – there is nothing like the scent of quince cooking up. there’s a persian stew i grew up eating with quince in it, called Khoreshte Beh. you’ve inspired me to try to make it myself for the first time!
Debra says
I can imagine how good this is with yogurt in the mornings. I love when one kitchen experiment leads to another (and another and another) with great results!
Ann P. says
I really appreciate this quince highlight! As an apple/pear lover, it sounds like the perfect fruit for me! I also love making anything belle helene (desserts with poached pear + chocolate), so this is an awesome new variation to try! Love all the different spices you added to bring out the flavor more, too 🙂
Alison says
Very nice – especially with yoghurt! I was a little careless, and added too many cardamom pods, but apart from that, the flavour is wonderful! 😉
Leif says
I had poached quince this evening. I peeled and cored them, then cut them lengthways into 5mm thick slices. I poached them in a small amount of water, with a cover on the pot, plus one tablespoon of maple syrup for two small fruits, and two small pieces of star anise. They were tender in ten minutes, with only one tablespoon of liquid left. The flavour was out of this world, very like pineapple. These were yellow when cooked, not pink. It sounds like we have different varieties.
Brandon Matzek says
Thanks so much for sharing!! Sounds delicious. There a several different varietals of quince and one is actually called a pineapple quince!
S. Vitkovitsky says
I tried poaching quince, and they turned to mush immediately! I can’t figure out why, as the fruit was yellow, fragrant, etc. As required. It was picked from a neighbor’s yard, with her permission, in late autumn.
The taste part way through cooking was incredibly tart, even with nearly double the sugar that the recipe required. I don’t know why this happened, as most of the recipes I have read for poached quince suggest a long cooking time is required, that the quince quarters stay whole, and eventually turn rosy.
Brandon Matzek says
Hi, I’m not 100% sure why your quince would have turned mushy while cooking! Perhaps it was too ripe? I recently made a batch of this to double check and it came out great. There are a different varietals of quince out there, so perhaps the one you used isn’t the best for cooking?