“Jingle bells jingle bells”…oops, wrong season, probably meant to be more like “dong dong qiang” (I’ve lost my mind, it’s 1am now and I am overly excited about my upcoming trip back home next week so please forgive my madness.)
It’s me again back with a new recipe for those who:
A – Love shortbread
B – Are too lazy to wrap and bake pineapple tarts
C – But still wanna eat pineapple tarts
D – Don’t like how sweet pineapple tarts can be
I originally had no intention of sharing this particular recipe because I felt a little precious about it but since so many of you have messaged me asking it, I decided to just share it and not keep it to myself with the trust and faith that no one will decide to take this recipe to use it as a base for selling and making a profit.
I would greatly appreciate it if this was used only to share the love and joy and baked for friends and family as gifts over this festive season. (I am definitely also more than happy for it to be used for charity purposes like how some of you have done with the other recipes and have shared with me about it previously).
This dough is a little finicky with the rolling and cutting with pineapple shapes etc but I figured I’ll share what I can without going into the crazy details my usual posts go into and let you take it from there.
This started off as a “what if” concept original in my mind and ended up coming to life. Unlike some of my “inspired by” recipes, this is a “inspired” of pineapple tarts in a original concept.
A description of the cookie is, think of it as a regular shortbread and as you eat it you get all the flavours and aromatics of a pineapple tart and the lingering after effect is as though you had a pineapple tart but without the over the top sweetness that the jam can give in regular pineapple tarts.
So let’s get a move on shall we? 🙂
Only thing I would point out is a few things to note still:
- Butter: I like using golden churn for this just to get the flavour but you can use any butter with a good butterfat content that is slightly salted (you can use unsalted too but might want to add a touch more salt), cultured is my preference.
- I am using my homemade pineapple jam from my pineapple tart recipe but with only pineapple, sugar and maltose. No spices etc.
- The jam has been cooked to a softer consistency as per the clip, shouldn’t be a big deal if yours is firmer. You can use store bought jam as well but sweetness will vary.
- This dough is really soft. If you are insistent on rolling and slicing with cookie cutters then I suggest you portion it into smaller sheets when you roll it out so it doesn’t melt too quickly whilst your hand the sitting rest in the freezer.
- I bake with a perforated mat, you can just use baking paper and just go by colour of the shortbread.
- My recommendation is to be fuss free – roll them into logs, freeze and slice them. It won’t look cute since you won’t have the pineapple shape but it’s – 1, easier 2, faster
- I sprinkle with sugar before baking to add some sweetness, but you can leave it out if you want it less sweet
- Bake times when sliced might differ so one again observe it and go by colour. It might take anywhere from 10-13mins
- Lastly, please don’t ask for measurements of the spices in spoons. I used a scale and that’s about all I can offer you. You can go by taste and adjust if you do not have a scale that measure to that extent before you add the cake flour.
- If using stand mixer, use paddle attachment.
- Lastly, I tripled my batch in the video thus the bigger quantity.
Pineapple “Tart” Shortbread
Makes roughly 20 pineapple shaped cookies (The video quantities is for a triple batch)
What you’ll need
- 100g Golden Churn canned butter (soft), preferred but not crucial
- 86g pineapple jam, homemade or store bought (notes above)
- 15g icing sugar, pure
- 1/2 tsp Vanilla extract
- 0.2 ground cardamom
- 0.5 ground cinnamon
- 0.27 ground cloves
- Fine salt 1.5g
- 20g egg yolk
- 22g corn starch
- 108g cake flour
- White sugar for sprinkling
Making it!
Make your pineapple jam as per my pineapple tart recipe with just the pineapples, sugar and maltose. Do not add any spices to it. You want to cook it to the texture as per the video where it is a little softer than the usual pineapple jam fillings.
In a bowl, give your butter a quick whisk until smooth. Sift in the icing sugar, salt and spices and whisk until fluffy.
Add vanilla and egg yolk and whisk until fluffy
Add corn starch and whisk further
Add pineapple jam and give it a nice whisk to in corporate it into the mixture. You don’t need to whisk it too much.
Sift in the cake flour and swap to a spatula. Fold the flour in
Transfer your dough to a cling wrap if you are rolling it out to cut with a cookie cutter or transfer to a baking paper and roll into a log if slicing them to bake instead.
Cookie cutter: Refrigerate the dough for at least 2 hours until firm and chilled through or overnight (preferable)
Roll to 6mm thick, freeze the cookie dough sheet thoroughly and cut into desired shape. Freeze or refrigerate the sliced cookie dough.
Slice and bake: Freeze your cookie dough log. Once thoroughly frozen, slice into approximately 6mm thick pieces rounds.
Baking: Remove from freezer (or fridge), sprinkle white sugar on and bake 160C convection for 10-13mins. May still look pale but start to take on colour along the edges. My pineapple cookies took 13 mins on my perforated mat.
Cool on tray 5 mins, transfer to cooling rack to cool fully. Store in airtight container. These should last like any shortbread would.
Buttermilk Pantry 