Saturday 11 January 2014

Pineapple Tarts







Back track 20 years ago or more...
What inspired me to bake ?
It all started with 'this story'..I passed by a bakery shop near my place after work.. I was living in central SG..
I saw the many tubs of pineapple tarts displayed at the shop. So I walked into the shop and wanted to buy. The shopkeeper said"did u place order?' I replied "no". Then he said rudely "then we can't sell to u"..and he walked away.
I was a little angry by his attitude..but no choice since I didn't pre-order. After that I went to the nearby hawker centre fruit stall and bought 2 whole pineapples and went home to make jam and then make pineapple tarts. Back then I have not baked any cookies before. I have not attended any course before. Not even in secondary school I didn't take home econ..so baking is alien to me.
I do not have any recipe. But i know my aunt 婶婶is very good at it.. I phoned her and she taught me over the phone. Back then no google recipe unlike now everything and recipe is easily found in google. Back then difficult to get recipe. With my aunt's(婶婶) verbal recipe and my mum-in-laws' help.. I started my first pineapple tarts..

God is humorous by sending such people to inspire me to start baking. Just as the bible is written...

The Lord says, “My thoughts are not like your thoughts. Your ways are not like my ways. Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. Rain and snow fall from the sky and don’t return without watering the ground. They cause the plants to sprout and grow, making seeds for the farmer and bread for the people. The same thing is true of the words I speak. They will not return to me empty. They make the things happen that I want to happen, and they succeed in doing what I send them to do. (Isaiah 55:8-11)

All thanks be to God. :)

You may visit also my facebook page Catherine's Cooking Journal

Ingredients (Pastry- yield about 75pcs):
360g plain flour
50g milk powder
1/4 tsp salt
3 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
250g soft cold butter( I use salted)
1 eggyolk + 1 whole egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg for eggwash

Method:
Put all the ingredients ( except egg and vanilla ) into a big bowl. Rub the dry ingredients with butter using your fingertips till it resemble breadcrumb. Add egg and vanilla. Continue to work into a soft dough.  Do not over work.

Place dough on a working board, with a rolling pin. roll it flat. Use a pineapple tart cutter, cut into shape. Place the cookie in a tray with baking paper. Place the jam on top of the pastry. Eggwash - beat the egg with a fork then use a brush to eggwash on the tart.

Bake in pre-heat oven 180 degree Celsius for 15 - 20min.


Pineapple Jam:
Please see my pineapple-tarts-enclosed-version on how to make pineapple jam in the traditional way.

Updates on 4/Jan/2016:
Rice Cooker Pineapple Jam




I have done pineapples jam in different ways over years. I have tried slow cooker, black claypot, chinese wok and the latest rice cooker. Always looking for better way to cook the jam. And of the whole pineapple tart, making homecooked jam the most time consuming process. However, it is also the jam that makes the different in the pineapple tarts. Different family has their unique taste of homecooked jam. Some like very sweet so added alot of sugar. For my personal taste, I prefer less sweet version. However, for the sake of majority in the family, I will compromise with the family..that is I will add a little more sugar than my usual standard of sweetness. So that family members will not find the tarts too not sweet.

Back to method of cooking the jam. Of all the different methods, using slow cooker is easy but rice cooker is the easiest. Save time standing at the stove stiring the jam. I used to stand at the stove stiring in the hot kitchen. But now no more sweaty and smelly. After putting grated pineapple into rice cooker to cook. You can go sit at the sofa enjoying a cup coffee or tea and watch your favorite korean drama or do housework or read a book while waiting for the juice to dry up. This rice cooker method dry up faster, could be I was doing other things so feel faster. And it doesn't burnt until when it is almost drying due to the natural sugar in the pineapple. As I used stainless steel pot, it turns brown at the bottom for the first time when I was cooking it. Because I thought the jam will be like rice when liquid dried up, the ricer cooker will jump to keep warm mode. So as I was waiting, I smell something burnt. That was how I had realised, approaching liquid drying up, you will need to stir a bit. That is, about 2 hours after putting to cook. And the jam will start drying after 2 hours of cooking. Always add sugar after the liquid dry up. Or else you will end up having very dark pineapple jam. To achieve nice golden colour, add sugar after all the pineapple juice about to dry up. DO NOT drain any juice in the process. Jam without draining juice though take longer to cook, but it will taste nicer too.  Being patience, faithfully cooking the jam with the juice will give you very nice jam. The longer you cook the jam, will also help to preserve the jam longer. That is, you can keep up to a year in fridge also no issue. Because this jam has added quite a fair amount of sugar. Sugar isca natural preservative agent. But, i will not suggest you keep it for that longer.


Ingredients:
2 big honey pineapple (green) after removed skin and "eyes" weigh appro. 750g per pineapple
150-200g appro. Or 10 tablespoons white sugar or your taste desire
3-4 clove
1/2 stick cinnamon

Method:
1. Remove pineapple skin and "eyes"

2. Using food processor to blend the whole pineapple including core until mushy. Or use knife to chop until mushy.

3. Place pineapple(do not drain juice) into rice cooker, add clove and cinnamon stick. Set rice cooker to "cook"  mode like you are cooking rice. Let it cook until almost dry. It is approximately 2 hours.  It also depend on your rice cooker and also pineapple. If very ripe, it will be more juicy so take longer. My rice cooker is using stainless steel pot, so approaching to dry, the base started to brown. So do check once in a while using a wooden spoon to stir and check. Btw, it will not pop to warm mode as the liquid in the pineapple will not be as dry as rice. So check in between.
The good thing about using rice cooker is save time standing at the stove stiring. You put it into rice cooker to cook(covered) and go doing housework or watch drama and let the rice cooker do the work. Just like when you cook rice at the stove, you need to stir non-stop to prevent burnt. But using rice cooker you do not worry about that...just that approaching dry or after 2 hours check on the jam.

4. When the pineapple is about to dry. Add sugar and stir and continue to cook. Stir once in a while to avoid burnt at the base until the jam is dry.

5. When it is cooled, roll it into 9-10g balls to use on tarts or store in container and keep in refrigerator. I usually make the jam 1 month ahead. Making jam is the most time consuming process for the tarts. So always make it earlier. This recipe yield over 80pcs of 9-10g pineapples jam balls.

NOTE:
As I used honey pineapple for this recipe instead of morris pineapple. Therefore, this pineapple is sweeter than the morris pineapple which are normal use for pineapple tart. Because the pineapple is sweeter, I have added lesser sugar. The amount of sugar to add depend on the type of pineapple is used and whether it is ripe or unripe or semi-ripe. So, asjust the sweeten according to your desire.

These few days, few friends asked me these questions after viewing this link.

1. Do you cover the rice cooker when it is cooking?
Answer : Yes. Like cooking rice.

2. Do you stir when put to cook?
Answer:  Please refer to above item 3 and 4.

Notes dated 15Jan2016:
My sister did the rice cooker pineapple jam on last sunday. Apparently different kind of rice cooker does make a different. My sister owns a rice cooker that on normal rice cooking takes an hour and quick cook half hour. As compare to my rice cooker, cooking rice takes only 20mins. My rice cooker only have 3 functions - porridge, warm & rice.
My sister told me her pineapple jam sit in rice cooker for an hour and it still didn't start cooking. Her jam took longer time to cook than mine. And it didn't able to cook jam until very dry as her rice cooker keep jumping to "keep warm". So, she poured out the jam and continue cook over stove and got it done in very short time. In gengeral, she still prefer the rice cooker way. As she said no need to keep standing at the stove stiring the jam and it shorten the cooking time.

27Dec2016 Updates:
Yields : approx 1.4kg-1.5kg(220pcs 2cm balls)
2 big + 3 medium  honey pineapples
150g rock sugar
350g white sugar
9 cloves
1 stick cinnamon





It is double the quantity. So today it took  total 4hours to cook the jam. The rest of the method is the same.

Updates on 21Jan2017:
Made another batch of jam added only rock sugar. The colour tone is lighter. This is the ingredients :

2 big honey pineapples
Half stick cinnamon
5 cloves
160g  rock sugar

Method refer to the above ricer cooker recipe.
Cooking time : 2hours

This is the results :




If you have also tried this rice cooker way of cooking jam, would welcome your comments.

Happy cooking and baking.

You may like to also view my other posts:
1. almond-cookies
2. almond-cookies-simple-version

As some friends are interested in the mould that I am using. Attached picture here for your reference.

😁






11 comments:

  1. These tarts looked lovely. Thks for yr kind sharing.

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  2. Your tarts the way u do it looked so pretty. I have tried using a rice cooker to cook my pineapple jam and it took aproximately 4.5 hours to make the jam of 1800 kg of pineapple. I find using a rice cooker to cook the pineapple jam is good because it does not stick to the botom of the pan and it does not burn so easily compared to cooking over the induction cooker or gas.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you. Glad that you like it. Yes indeed it does stick to the base when using rice cooker. No need to keep stiring😊

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    2. It does not* stick to the base when using rice cooker

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    3. It does not* stick to the base when using rice cooker

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    4. in fact it took quite long to cook in a rice cooker for all the juice to dry up. about 4.5 hours.

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    5. Jeanine Low
      It depend the type of rice cooker you are using and quantity of pineapples. More pineapples longer time just like cooking more rice take longer time. My aunt just completed her 6 pineapples in 4hours using rice cooker

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    6. Jeanine Low
      It depend the type of rice cooker you are using and quantity of pineapples. More pineapples longer time just like cooking more rice take longer time. My aunt just completed her 6 pineapples in 4hours using rice cooker

      Delete
  3. Hi Catherine, I just got a slow cooker as a free gift and am excited to try. Do you have the method for slow cooker, ie. do I turn the cooker to low or medium? Do I switch to high later on? Thanks so much for teaching!

    ReplyDelete