We were eating cool chunks of pineapple after dinner the other night when the question came up about how pineapples grow.

I’d never given this any thought, but my guess was that they grew on trees, much like coconuts. I’ve no idea why I thought that, but it’s not so, each pineapple fruit grows from the top of it’s own ground level plant.

You probably knew that.

However it grows, it’s a delicious fruit and although there is really no need to fancy it up by cooking it, pineapple does make some very yummy desserts.

There’s just one recipe here but you can use it to produce two entirely different desserts from a single pineapple.

Grilled Pineapple with Spicy Coconut Dip

This is a fantastic dessert because of the number of ways you can serve it. It’s great hot but is equally good prepared ahead and eaten cold, which is especially handy for picnics. You can also barbecue the pineapple and serve it hot with chilled dip.

It’s an excellent way of using up the half tin of coconut milk left over after making this curry.

The amounts below will serve 4 people.

1/2 tin unsweetened coconut milk
1-2 teaspoons of sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon unsweetened cocoa powder*
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
2 tablespoons of dark rum (or a half teaspoon of rum essence)

Half a large pineapple

* The cocoa powder may seem a bit out here, but it won’t make the dip taste of chocolate, it just gives it depth.

1. Make the Dip

In a saucepan mix the coconut milk with one spoon of sugar and the all of the seasonings, whisking to make sure they are well blended.

Bring to the boil and keep simmering for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until it has reduced to about two thirds of it’s original volume. Taste it.  The pineapple is so sweet that this needs to be just very mildly sweet, but if it isn’t sweet enough for you add the second spoon of sugar. You can also add some more spice if you think it’s needed.

2. Grill the Pineapple

Cut the pineapple into four round slices. Peel and cut each round into 4 strips. Put each strip on a skewer and arrange on an oven proof tray.

I cover the tray with foil because it can otherwise be quite sticky and hard to clean afterwards.

Brush each strip with the dip fairly generously. Put under a hot grill for about 10 minutes or until nicely brown. Then turn over, brush the other side with dip and grill again.

Rest these for about 2-3 minutes before serving as they will be way to hot to eat, then serve on the skewers with the dip in a bowl.

You can make everything ahead of time, keep in the fridge and just pop the pineapple back under the grill for a few minutes and reheat the dip in the microwave just before you want to serve them.

Spiced Pineapple Sorbet

If you want to use up a whole can of coconut just make twice the amount of dip and keep half in the fridge till the next day, because you can use exactly the same recipe to make this Spiced Pineapple Sorbet.

To make this freeze chunks of pineapple in advance, which will take at least 6 hours. Remove from freezer and leave to stand for about 15 minutes, and at the same time put the dip into the freezer.

Then put the pineapple into a blender, blend until it is a fine, slightly icy, pulp. Blend in the now very chilled coconut dip.

If it’s a little too runny, put the entire mix back in the freezer for about 20-30 minutes. Or if you’re in a hurry just serve it in glasses and call it Spiced Pineapple Whip instead!

I’d usually sprinkle this with toasted coconut flakes to serve but I didn’t have any so used some toasted crushed nuts instead.

How Much does it Cost?

It’s quite hard to come up with exact costs, because the price of both pineapple and coconut milk will vary and it’s hard to compute the cost of teaspoons of spices. But here is what these cost me, priced for both recipes, each with enough to serve 4.

Costs: Pineapple 89c; coconut milk €1.40; spices & flavourings 60c (wild guess!).

So that’s 8 scrumtious desserts for a total of about €2.90, or around 36c per portion! Of course Lidl will not always have pinapples for this amazing price, but even if they were at full price the cost would be under 50c per portion.

Tags: Dessert, Pineapple, Recipes
Posted in Recipes | 3 Comments »

If there are still people labouring under the illusion that Lidl sells inferior fruit, just get them to take a look at this beauty.

And it tastes every bit as good as it looks - juicy, sweet, succulent, utterly delicious.

These very large pineapples from Costa Rica have been on sale for a while in Lidl for around €1.99, which I honestly thought was a tremendous bargain.

When I went in yesterday they were reduced to a truly amazing 89c. They were walking out of the store - I’d say half of Kilkenny ate pineapple last night - so there may not be any left, but it would be well worth a special trip to Lidl just to get one of these, even at full price.

You could easily eat all of a pineapple just as it is, but I’ll have a great pineapple recipe tomorrow, so you might want to keep a little to try it out.

Tags: Bargains, Fruit, Pineapple
Posted in Best Buys | 8 Comments »