"pineapple" news and stories

Ancient custom of Finland, or just a great combo from a Scandinavian guy who loves his tropical fruit with his red meat? Finnish photographer Ansik captured this burger with a healthy slab of pineapple wedged among the lettuce and cheese. Lanai, Hawaii, and Turku, Finland, suddenly have a lot in common.

If you, like Ansik, can't get enough of pineapple with your protein, check out a more complex set of flavors in this recipe for chicken burgers with grilled pineapple salsa. The fruit is combined with both sweet and jalapeño (or serrano) peppers, onion, cilantro and garlic, for a sweet-savory-spicy topping.

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Happy National Pineapple Upside-Down Cake Day!

The glossy, fruity cake is suspected to date back to the 1920s, when the Maraschino cherry and pineapple were popular, readily available products to the American public. Thought to have been inspired by skillet cakes cooked on the stove by settlers lacking ovens, the pineapple upside-down cake was popularized by the Hawaiian Pineapple Company (later renamed Dole), when they published a series of ads featuring pineapple recipes in 1925 in numerous women's magazines.

This gloriously moist rendition of the classic cake was executed by blogger Brown Eyed Baker, who promises it's an "easy recipe to manage and quick to get in the oven." Using a buttermilk cake base decoratively topped with Maraschino cherries and pineapple slices, she promises the resulting cake is "moist with a tender crumb and a rich flavor, almost melting in your mouth. The pineapples and brown sugar/butter topping provide a great contrasting sweetness, but are not overpowering."

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Don't be daunted by the pineapple's prickly shell -- peeling the fruit is easy in these simple steps.

This photo does what neither a fruit cup nor cocktail with an umbrella ever could: It makes pineapple look damn sexy. Or, more accurately, smokin' hot. Taken by Another Pint Please... at Flickr, it presents a strong case for the addition of grill marks to any food: They're the edible version of great highlights or the perfect shade of lipstick. These pineapples were apparently marinated in rum and then used as the basis for an upside down cake, which is possibly the best thing to happen to the fruit -- next to grill marks, of course.

[Via Flickr]

When I was in Mexico, I tried a simple sweet and spicy dessert - chunks of pineapple sprinkled with dried chili flakes and salt, and drizzled with limes. A pineapple can be prepared for a complicated dessert or for something as simple as fruit salad.

This exquisite tropical fruit can be grilled or roasted. Recently, I tried Martha Stewart's recipe for grilled pineapple with coconut sorbet. It's the perfect antidote to the cold wintry weather. Pineapples work well in desserts due to its unique tropical sweetness and its bright yellow color. I'll never forget the light fluffy cake toppled with pineapples that I tried last May at Pierre Hermé in Paris.

Below are 8 recipes for pineapple desserts:

1. Chilled Pineapple Mousse with Pistachios
2. Roasted Pineapple with Star Anise Pineapple Sorbet
3. Caramelized-Pineapple Baked Alaskas
4. Pineapple Upside-Down Cake
5. Pineapple-Coconut Napoleons with Mascarpone Cream and Pineapple Syrup
6. Carrot and Pineapple Cake
7. Roasted Pineapple Milkshake
8. Coconut Ice Cream with Warm Rum Glazed Pineapple

What are some of your favorite ways to prepare pineapples in dessert?