pineapple tarts part three: the servening

In the end, these are the pineapple tarts I settled on for CNY. They are gluten-free, suitable for our gluten-free buddies. I think further tweaking is required - I want to try adding custard powder, and I'd love to try something using rice flour. But still, these turned out okay, and I love making and eating these kuih.

Some other people's (non-vegan) recipes: A Table for Two; Nyonya Food; The Little Teochew.



gluten-free pineapple tarts

The GF flour means that these kuih go stale very quickly, so I have to make the pastry for these on the day I plan to serve them.

ingredients
half a dozen cloves
500g pineapple chunks (I used a 430g can)
200g (ish) sugar
1 aniseed star
1 tablespoon gf flour (or something starchy)

2 heaped cups gluten-free flour
4 teaspoons icing sugar
3 teaspoons soy flour
1 tablespoon cornflour (make sure this is gf! some are, some are not)
2 shakes of salt
220g nuttelex/margarine (cold)
2 chinese soup spoons of applesauce

5g applesauce
1 tablespoon soy milk


method

For the jam: Press out as much liquid as possible from the pineapple, and then in a saucepan, simmer with sugar, cloves and star anise for between half an hour and fifty minutes, until the pineapple has reduced. Squish some of the pineapple pieces if necessary. Stir in the gf flour, and remove from heat. Leave this to cool for up to a few days (though it is ready to use after a few hours).

For the entartening: Beat together the margarine with the apple sauce. Make sure that you work the margarine from cold, don't melt it or anything. Slowly add the flours, icing sugar, and salt, until just combined. Put in fridge to rest whilst you prepare the jam.



Roll the jam out into little tubes, approx 1.5cm in length. It is easiest if you prepare the jam in this way, so you just pick it up and drop it in the pastry.

When I'm working with the pastry, if it's warm I like to keep an icepack under the mixing bowl, to keep it a bit cooler in my warm kitchen.

Tear off a small amount of the batter, this will vary depending on how moist it has ended up - it needs to be not too moist, but not too dry or it will fall apart and crack too much. Flatten the batter in the palm of your hand, until it is even and looks like it will wrap around a jam dollop. Drop that jam in, and roll the pastry around it. Make sure there are no gaps, or the jam will leak out when baking. Continue until all the batter or jam is used up.



Using a fork, carefully score the surface of the tarts. Combine the remaining apple sauce and milk, and brush on the top.

Bake for 18 minutes at 175C in a preheated oven.

vegan kuih in melbourne

DEAR VEGAN MELBOURNE (AND PREFERABLY ANY MALAYSIANS PRESENT),



Terrible news! I have been trying to locate vegan kuih kapit/love letters in Melbourne, but to no avail! They all contain egg! Miss T, who conveniently is currently in Perth, attempted to purchase them for me from my mother's Chinese grocer (in Perth), because my sister swore to me that they are selling vegan love letters, but alas! Fail!

My parents are coming to visit in just over a week, and obligingly they will bring me some, but I want them for CNYE! Does anybody know where I could find them? I've tried many grocers on Victoria Street in Richmond, Minh Phat, and the vegetarian grocery in Box Hill. I will probably adventure out to Footscray as soon as I get an opportunity. I am willing to travel! Mostly because I am not willing to make them.

Here are some other examples: folded (usually not vegan); rolled (sometimes vegan except apparently not for meeeee).

Any assistance that anyone could offer would be greatly appreciated. Why is this city not more Malaysian? It pains me.

Regards
Stephanie

PS ALSO my macbook failed, and took all my unpublished recipes with it! So the pineapple tarts have returned to 'experimental' status.

pineapple tarts part two: de-glutening

Please see pineapple tarts part one: the jamening for previous adventures in pineapple tarts.

Last week's batch of pineapple tarts resulted in too much batter and insufficient jam quantities. Buoyed by my success of first time jam, I decided to go for a double batch of jam, using one large tin of crushed pineapple instead of one small tin of diced pineapple.



This was a mistake! The jam started simmering away happily, then took one million trillion years to reduce, and then started burning to the base! The end result was a very strong pineapple jam, in the wrong colour, and of copious quantities! It was perfectly serviceable for experimenting, but I would probably not serve it to anyone!

The purpose of part two was to see if I could make this batch free from gluten.



I would judge this as moderate success - the flavour of the pastry was a bit milder than I would ideally like it, and it didn't need as long in baking (the end result with the same baking time is a little stiff, clearly over cooked). The pastry goes stale after one day, but I was expecting that. Overall, however, I think I am foreseeing success in my gf pineapple tart future.

pineapple tarts part one: the jamening

There's a bit of a reputation for Chinese people to not like sweet things. The evidence for this, I suppose, is in our savoury desserts and in our lack of chocolate (...valid points). This fits, I suppose, with the Nyonya kuih, sweets that are not sweet (and are, in fact, savouries), biscuits that are not really sugary. And they are delicious, my very favourite biscuits ever. More favourite than tim tams, before I went vegan!

I don't know how to describe my love of kuih, but I will try, in this way: I just found this clip on the SBS website, and it is a minute and a half of wordless kuih-making, and I spent the entire time filled with longing and delight and want (TO EAT IT ALL).

Often (but not always) made from glutinous rice flour, kuih range from cakes, to biscuits, to wafer thin pastries. And Chinese New Year is the jackpot, mountains of kuih, bright colours and biscuits that melt when you put them on your tongue. Kuih is often vegan, except sometimes you need to watch out for eggwash, or in some of the cakes actual eggs.

This CNY my kuih goal is pineapple tarts. Pineapple tarts come in three forms: closed, rolled open, and open. The first attempt at pineapple tarts began, oddly enough, not with picking a recipe (though that was part of it), but picking a style.



I baked all three, and have picked closed. Styled with patience and accuracy, they look like tiny pineapples, and the way the pastry crumbles through your whole mouth is awesome.

However before baking, I first made pineapple jam! You may remember my recent requests that people make jam and then give it to me, because I am not a jam maker. I spent some time searching the shops nearby for pineapple jam, and though I found quince, rosehip, fig, apricot, raspberry, tropical, strawberry and ginger marmalade jams, I was quite unable to locate pineapple jam. So I bought a can of pineapple instead, and made pineapple jam! It was great! Super easy, and it made for jam of perfect consistency to put inside the dough.

And so it was, two firsts in one day, labouriously playing with pineapples. The thing is, I don't even like pineapples - but I love pineapple kuih!

The recipe is not quite finalised, so more to come - I have high hopes that I can make this gluten free (pineapple tarts are one of the few kuih that are not made with rice flour). And expect more CNY posts as we get closer, and I try out more things.