Pineapple and custard tarts

https://www.puregoldpineapples.com.au/recipes/pineapple-custard-tarts/

INGREDIENTS

quarter (1 1⁄2 cups or 200 g) pineapple, finely diced; 1 teaspoon butter; 1 tablespoon caster sugar; half cup (125 ml) thickened cream; 1 tablespoon icing sugar; half teaspoon vanilla extract; half cup (125 ml) thick custard; 8 small pastry tart shells

METHOD

For Pineapple topping:

Heat fry pan to medium high, then melt butter until foaming.

Add diced pineapple, sprinkle with caster sugar and sauté for 4 minutes, stirring once per minute or until pineapple begins to caramelise. Set aside and cool.

For Custard filling:

In a large bowl whisk cream, icing sugar and vanilla until firm peaks form, then stir in custard.

Spoon custard cream filling into tart shells.

Top with cooked pineapple and dust with icing sugar to serve.

Happy 10th Birthday Pineapple Princesses !!!

Ann and I recently had a quiet get together to reminisce over the last ten years of being Pineapple Princesses! 

Starting in July 2012 we cooked our way through Ruby Borrowdale’s “Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book” and then kept going! We’re still cooking new pineapple recipes from many different sources – some retro, some contemporary. 

The oldest recipe we used, for Pineapple in Rum, was from Australia’s first cookbook, “The English and Australian Cookery Book” by Edward Abbott published 1864 in London.

We have posted recipes each week over the ten years which has amounted to almost 800 posts including over a thousand recipes. This is definitely your go to pineapple recipe collection!!

To celebrate, Ann cooked us a delicious pineapple salmon curry and maple syrup pineapple upside down cake! Woo hoo!!! Anne

Pineapple Magic: delicious, easy recipes for a family on the go, Golden Circle online, Queensland 2010

Thai Salmon and Pineapple Curry (based on a prawn recipe)

Serves 4

2 tbsp Thai red curry paste; 400ml can coconut milk; 3 kaffir lime leaves, torn; 1 tbsp grated palm sugar; 1 tbsp fish sauce; 150g green beans, trimmed and cut into thirds; 280g chopped salmon; 440g can Golden Circle Pineapple Pieces in Juice, drained; 8 cherry tomatoes, halved; steamed Jasmine rice, to serve; coriander leaves to garnish, optional

1. Add curry paste to a hot frying pan and cook 1 minute or until fragrant. Add the coconut milk, lime leaves, palm sugar and fish sauce and bring to a gentle simmer.

2. Add green beans and cook for 2 minutes. Stir in the salmon, pineapple and cherry tomatoes and simmer for a further 2 - 3 minutes, or until the salmon is cooked through.

3. Remove lime leaves and transfer curry to serving bowls. Serve with rice and garnish with coriander if desired.

Red Curry Paste

1 tblspn coriander seeds; 2 tspn cumin seeds; 1 tspn black peppercorns; 2 tspn dries shrimp paste; 1 tspn ground nutmeg; 12 dried or fresh red chillies, rough chopped; 1 cup French shallots, chopped; 2 tblspn oil; 4 stems lemon grass (white part only) finely chopped; 12 small cloves garlic, chopped; 2 tblspn fresh coriander roots, chopped; 2 tblspn fresh coriander stems, chopped; 6 kaffir lime leaves, chopped; 2 tspn grated lime rind; 2 tspn salt; 2 tspn turmeric; 1 tspn paprika

1. Place the coriander and cumin seeds in a dry frying pan and heat for 2-3 minutes, shaking the pan constantly.

2. Place the roasted spices and peppercorns in a mortar and pestle or clean coffee grinder and work them until they are finely ground. Wrap the shrimp paste in a small amount of foil and cook under a hot grill for 3 minutes, turning the package twice.

3. Process the ground spices, roasted shrimp paste, nutmeg and chillies in a food processor for 5 seconds. Add the remaining ingredients and process for 20 seconds at a time, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula each time, until the mixture forms a smooth paste.

Makes approximately 1 cup.

Pineapple Upside Down Cake (based on a Margaret Fulton recipe)

Line a cake tin with paper and grease with butter.  Pour in ¾ cup maple syrup. Lay half slices of canned pineapple rings in a circle around the tin on top of the maple syrup.                                                                                                                                                                              60g soft butter, 1/2 tsp vanilla essence, 3/8 cup sugar, 1 egg, 1 cup self raising flour and ¼ cup milk

Process the butter, sugar and vanilla until fluffy, beat in the egg, then pulse the flour and milk alternately until just mixed. 

Pour or dollop on top of pineapple, smooth top and bake in mod oven until cooked for 30 minutes.

And here are a couple of little tropical beauties from the recent 

                                              Dungog Tea Party Exhibition NSW!!                                           

Orange-cup (and pineapple) dessert

Creative Cooking for Two, edited by Jane Solmson 1988 (from the Creative Cooking Series)

                                                                                               Orange-cup Dessert

“A very pretty and refreshing dessert” the author

2 oranges with unblemished skin; fruit such as pineapple, orange sections, grapefruit sections, bananas, maraschino cherries, walnuts (I used pistachios)

Cut slice from top of each orange so insides can be scooped out.

Combine any of the above fruits, or others of your choice; spoon into orange shells. Refrigerate until serving time.

The same thing can be done with grapefruit or split bananas. If desired, a small amount of your favourite liqueur can be added to the fruit.

Pineapple Jiffy Cake

Cakes and Cake Decorating by Marguerite Patten & Betty Dunleavy 1968 Australian edition

Pineapple Jiffy Cake

6 tblspn plain flour and 3 level tspn baking powder; 4 tblspn castor sugar; 2 tblspn butter or margarine; 1 beaten egg; 1 tspn vanilla essence; ½ pt milk

For the icing and decoration: 12 tblspn sieved icing sugar; 3 tblspn warmed pineapple juice, taken from a can of pineapple chunks; few drops lemon juice; few drops yellow colouring

Sieve the flour and baking powder together in a bowl and add the sugar. Mix together the melted butter, egg, vanilla essence and milk. Slowly add this to the dry ingredients and then beat thoroughly for 2 minutes for a smooth batter. Grease and line a 9” sandwich tin or a 8” square tine. Pour the batter mixture into the tin and bake for approximately 35 minutes in a moderate to moderately hot oven. 

Remove from the tin and cool on a wire rack. Beat the icing sugar, pineapple and lemon juice together until the icing becomes smooth and glossy and coats the back of the spoon. Mark a line across the centre of the cake and place a narrow strip of foil or greaseproof paper across this line. This will prevent the icing from spread.

Pour half the icing over one half of the cake, allowing it to coat the side. Add the colouring to the rest of the glace icing, remove the strip of paper and spread this icing on the other half of the cake.

Decorate with chopped pineapple, as shown in the picture, just as the icing begins to set.

Serve the remaining pineapple chunks with the cake as dessert, or the cake alone for tea.

I don't think my new career is cake decorating, but it's all about having a go isn't it??? 

And who doesn't love those little silver balls? Anne