INGREDIENTS
For the pineapple tart
200g butter, softened
80g icing sugar, sifted
390g plain flour, sifted with a big pinch of salt
to be mixed together with:
2 egg yolks
1 tbsp fresh milk/evaporated milk
For the pineapple jam
a mix of large unripe and half-riped Sarawak or Morris pineapples
350g granulated sugar, adjust to taste
1 lemon squeeze for the juice
2 cinnamon sticks
5 cloves
4 star anise
3 pandan leaves, knotted
Work on a ratio of roughly 4 cups pineapple puree to 1 cup granulated sugar.
Hand grate or blend the pineapple chunks in a jug blender by adding a little water to work the blender blade. Do not discard the core, separately blend it finely and mix together with the pulp to cook. It is not necessary to drain away the juice as this contain loads of flavour. In short, use the whole pineapple.
Use a heavy bottom pan or wok with a larger surface area to help with the evaporation process and to make it easier to stir.
Cook the blended puree without any added sugar first to reduce moisture content.
Add in knotted pandan leaves and a stick of cinnamon for flavour. Stir occasionally as a lot of spattering will occur while simmering the puree.
Once the paste has reduced most of its moisture content, add in the sugar and stir continuously to prevent burning. Beware of splatters but it will reduce when it thickens.
Take it off the heat when it reaches desired color and consistency.
DIRECTIONS
To stamp out the tarts:
Stamp out the tarts and placing them on trays lined with baking paper. Set aside.
Roll the pineapple filling into balls, about 5 gram each. Set aside.
Roll out the pastry scraps thinly for decoration.
Flour the plunger tool and stamp a pastry flower, centre it directly on top of the jam. Press the plunger to release the pastry cut-out. Lightly press the petals with your finger to keep it in shape.
To assemble the tarts
Mix butter and icing sugar till just combined using either a wooden spoon or hand held mixer. Make sure to not overdo it.
Add in the egg yolks and milk mixture. Mix well.
Gently fold in the flour with a large metal spoon and mix until it becomes a soft dough. Once there is no visible traces of flour, stop mixing.
Cover the dough with cling wrap and chill in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.
Roll out the dough to about 0.5 cm thick on a lightly floured worktop.
Flour your cutter and stamp out patterns of your choice. Transfer them onto paper lined baking trays.
Fill with balls of pineapple jam and decorate the top with leftover pastry scraps. Egg glaze is optional.
Bake at 180°C for about 15-20 minutes or until the edges and bottom of the tarts are slightly golden in colour.
Additional notes:
This recipe will produce tarts with a crisp bite when freshly baked but will softened slightly after awhile.
It is best to undercook the paste instead of overcooking it. Doing so tends to dry out and if you're making open face tarts, the colour of the jam will be too dark after baking. Try to keep the jam a shade lighter than the cooked product as it'll further darken and thicken upon cooling.
By rolling out the dough between two sheets of plastics, you can avoid using excess flour when rolling out the pastry dough.
Make sure that the cutter is well floured before each stamping as the pastry dough can be rather sticky at first. If the dough happens to stick to the cutter, use a toothpick to remove any excess dough stuck in it.
A daisy pattern sugarcraft plastic cutter was used for stamping out the little flowers for decorating.
Do the decorative step one at a time and avoid stamping a whole batch all at once before transferring it onto the balls of pineapple jam. The latter method is more time-consuming and the fragile pastry flowers will get distorted as well.
If you don't have the plastic plunger, you can always revert to the traditional latticed decoration though this is the most tedious part in making pineapple tarts.
Make sure the baked tarts are completely cooled before storing into air tight containers with papers in between the layers.
