Instructions: Peel the pears, leave the stem on (looks nice). In a pan, bring the water, pears, cinnamon and lemon peel to a boil. Stew for 3 1/2 hours. Bring back to a boil. Put the potato-flour in a cup and add a little water, stir. Stir it bit by bit into the boiling pear stuff until set to the thickness of sauce. Let boil for another few minutes. (Remove the cinnamon stick if you prefer). Put rice, milk and lemon grating into pan and boil for 30 minutes.

Soak the gelatine in a generous amount of (cold!) water for 10 minutes until soft. Squeeze the water out of the gelatine and add the gelatine to the rice mixture (TAKE THE PAN AWAY FROM THE STOVE). Dont boil it again!

The gelatine will not set and it tastes yukky. Add the vanilla sugar and the regular sugar. Let it cool down. Whip the cream until stiff. Work the cream into the rice mixture carefully using 2 large spoons. Cool again.

Serving suggestion: Reheat the pears until just warm. Serve them on the side with the rice pudding. Pour some of the pear juice over the pudding.

(*) Stick of cinnamon: you
*could* replace it with powder, but it wont taste the same (*) In the Netherlands we use sheets of gelatine. If you add up the
volumes of the ingredients im sure you can work out how much clear (no taste) gelatine powder of your own you should use. (*) If you dont have vanilla flavoured sugar, use regular and add some vanilla flavouring. Or even better: add a cut-open vanilla pod to the rice mixture while cooking. Scrape out the black centre and add to the pudding after cooking.

IMHO this recipe seems very little for 4 servings. The rice pudding can be rather heavy though. If you make it for visitors, just make sure to make a double portion, just in case they want seconds! And rice pudding is even better the next day. Cooking pears can also be eaten cold.

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