Pineapple filled cookies and silver spoons

Thanks to wonderful family and friends I seemed to have started a spoon collection! Colleen brought this very pretty, detailed one back from England during the year.

My friend Sal gave me this lovely one many years ago.

And Les recently bought this sifter sugar spoon online, Anne.

Betty Crocker’s Cooky Carnival from the famous Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book, 1957 USA

Mix thoroughly . . . ½ cup soft shortening; 1 cup sugar; 2 eggs.

Stir in . . . 2 tblspn thick cream; 1 tsp vanilla

Sift together and stir in . . . 2 ½ cups sifted GOLD MEDAL flour; ¼ tsp soda; ½ tsp salt

Chill dough. Roll very thin (2mm). Cut dough with scalloped round cookie cutter or with heart, diamond, or 6.5cm cutter of any desired shape, cutting 2 alike for each filled cooky. To give a decorative effect, cut the center out of the top cooky with a tiny heart, star, or scalloped round shape. Place the bottom pieces on lightly greased baking sheet. Spread desired filling on each . . . spreading up to the edge. Cover with top pieces, Press edges together.

Amount: 4 doz. 6.5cm cookies.

Pineapple Filling:

Mix in saucepan . . . 1 cup sugar; ¼ cup GOLD MEDAL flour

Stir in . . . 1 ½ cups well drained crushed pineapple; ¼ cup lemon juice; 3 tblspn butter; ¼ tsp nutmeg; ¾ cup pineapple juice

Cook slowly, stirring constantly, until thickened ( 5 to 10 min.) Cool.

Amount: Filling for 4 doz. cookies

Pineapples Are Art

The Pineapple Princesses were recently the lucky winners of a Radio National, Bush Telegraph, favourite pineapple recipe competition.  The competition was coordinated by The Queensland Gallery of Modern Art on Brisbane’s South Bank where they were holding an exhibition Harvest: Art, Film + Food “a celebration of food in art” with works from their collection and commissioned pieces.

 

 “The exhibition examines the ways land cultivation, food, food products and systems of distribution have throughout history, been central to the formation of world views and artistic expression.”

Zinnias and fruit 1932 by Hans Heysen

Still life: Coconut and other things 2009
by Shirana Shahbazi and Sirous Shaghaghi

The highlight for us was, of course, LA based art collective (Fallen Fruit) David Burns and Austin Young’s wall paper designs and glass cabinet display of pinapalia. The cabinet is the result of a callout they made to members of the community to contribute pineapple memorablilia. Their thought provoking ideas on "public fruit" and collaboration are excellent reading in the Harvest catalogue.

There were some real treasures! Perhaps you’re lucky enough to own some of these gems yourselves!

Public Fruit Wallpaper, Honolulu 2012 by Fallen Fruit

 

 

 

 

 

Our lunch at the GOMA Restaurant created by their Executive Chef, Josue Lopez, was a feast of discovery. We enjoyed:

Moreton Bay Bug poached in GOMA churned butter, saffron broth, seaweed, broccoli. A delicious light entrée, the crunch of baby fennel and sliced broccoli stalk complementing the soft bug flesh.  Saffron broth was poured over the composed ingredients at the table by the attentive and well informed wait staff.

Living Risotto of sprouted beans and legumes, broad bean, garden flowers, verjuice. This was the least successful dish of the lunch.  Rather than a risotto (there was no rice) it was more of a green porridge.  The chick peas and some of the beans were quite crunchy and the dish was heavily salted.  However, as part of the seven dish degustation, in a very small portion, it could work much better.  On top is not white cheese but freeze dried macadamia oil. The garden flowers were a counterbalance to the colour of the risotto.

Roasted Holmbrae chicken, textures of corn, sorrel, winter leaves. A satisfying main course with a tasty combination of flavours. The corn puree successfully under laid the succulent chicken, crisp kale and nasturtium leaves.

Wattle custard, Daintree chocolate paint, Daintree vanilla curd. What an exquisite flavour! The airbrushed chocolate was pretty spectacular. The dessert seemed to be very well thought out, from concept to execution.  Simple and complex at the same time.

Old fashioned whiskey cocktail . Nant single malt sorbet, blood orange and bitters, crisp honey. A fresh tasting dessert of citrus, whiskey and honey.  There is a Nant distillery in Brisbane city as well as Bothwell in Tasmania.  Lots of texture contrast – soft cherry puree balls, granular sorbet, honey leather, freeze dried cherry pieces, whiskey snow.

The Harvest catalogue is a beautiful production with commentary about the exhibition, the food related films that were shown and recipes using some very exotic ingredients from ten selected chefs.

http://www.qagoma.qld.gov.au/

Many thanks to Queensland Gallery of Modern Art, Hilton Brisbane, Virgin Airlines and Radio National! Anne and Ann.

Glimpses of English Pineapples

Roving reporter, Colleen, did some investigative journalism for the Pineapple Princesses while on a recent trip to the UK.  Here is her account.

“The following are just some of the pineapples spotted around London. They certainly seem almost as obsessed today as they were in the 19th century.

Well, this magazine (mostly of real estate with stratospheric prices and shopping) was in the hallway of Kat's flat building so I borrowed it for a while. I think you have a pair of earrings in your collection a bit like these - what a trend-setter!"

Grapes also appear to be popular.

"Now we have a tie in Spitalfields, an edgy, arty neighbourhood and a top which was for sale in Liberty for a substantial sum (£215.00)!

These are some gorgeous containers from Merchant Archive. They are supposedly copies of Victorian pineapple keepers. This shop also had a dress with an all-over pineapple pattern (not photographed). It was a very up-market chi-chi shop in Notting Hill.”

Sir William Hooker’s house, Greenwich.

Early 19^th century Coade stone ornamental pineapples decorating the gate piers at Ham House, Surrey.

“Eleanor Coade (1733 –1821) was a British businesswoman known for manufacturing Neoclassical statues, architectural decorations and garden ornaments made of Lithodipyra (Coade stone) for over 50 years from 1769 until her death. Lithodipyra (stone fired twice) was a high quality, durable moulded weather-resistant, ceramic stoneware.” (Wikipedia)

 

Tasmania, the PINEapple isle.

I couldn't leave this booklet behind in an op shop on Tasmania's east coast recently - what an appetising cover design!

Good Housekeeping’s Meals on a Shoestring, Booklet No 27 London 1964

Pineapple Rice

Prepare a rice pudding mixture in a double saucepan.

Rice Pudding – 40g pudding rice; 600ml milk; 15-25g butter or margarine; grated nutmeg

Wash the rice, place it in a 900ml pie dish with the milk and sugar and put shavings of butter and a little grated nutmeg over the top. Bake in a cool to warm oven 150°C for 2 – 2 ½ hours, stir it once or twice during the first hour.
Rice pudding may also be cooked in a double boiler; the proportion of ingredients and the cooking time will be the same.

I simply mixed some leftover cooked brown rice with the other ingredients in a saucepan and boiled them for 10 minutes, Anne.

Pineapple Rice – When the rice is creamy and tender, place in a pie dish or in individual dishes. Drain the juice from an 225g can of sliced pineapple and place in a small, saucepan, with a little sugar; boil rapidly until it reaches a glazing consistency. Arrange the pineapple slices on top of the rice and coat evenly with pineapple glaze. Leave to cool.

This dish was found in the treasure trove

"The Shop in the Bush" near St Helens. 

And this wonderful wall decoration enhances the hospitable Hotel Bruny at Alonnah, Bruny Island.