Poached Pears with Cardamom & Saffron

This was lovely -- pears poached in white wine to which sugar, cardamom and saffron have been added. Unusual, sophisticated flavor -- sweet but not too much so and the creme fraiche was a perfect topper.

The recipe calls for poaching whole peeled pears which I would have done if I was making this for a dinner party. But for an everyday weeknight meal, I went ahead and halved and cored the pears before poaching, and then reduced the cooking time from 30 to 20 minutes.

After removing the pears from the poaching liquid, the liquid is reduced to a thickened syrup ... which happens pretty quickly here ... the line between syrup and glaze is pretty fine.

Nice do ahead dish for entertaining.