Pear Preserve recipe

I've had a comment to my 2006 post about making pear preserves and a request for the recipe.

Here it is:

Peel, slice, and weigh pears. An approximately equal poundage of sugar will be needed to cover the pears, so if you have a big sack of pears, you'll need an appropriate amount of sugar. With this last batch, a full grocery sack of pears, it took 10 pounds of sugar to cover them. Add 1-3 thinly sliced lemons. Cover the kettle and let sit overnight. In the morning, there'll be a lot of syrup. Stir.

Start cooking over low heat and stir. The pears will "cook down" and there'll be more syrup. I like my pears slightly brown, but not chewy. I had two containers of pears going and over the course of the morning was able to siphon off sufficient syrup to combine the pears into one container. This means I probably squandered close to a gallon of liquid. I didn't know what else to do since I didn't want pear syrup. Stir. And stir. You don't want them sticking.

When they're the consistency you want, spoon into jars, seal, water-bath, 5 minutes for half-pints, 10 for pints. I got 13 half-pint jars and they are delicious!