Most pineapple cakes sold outside Taiwan are filled with winter melon and flavourings. This one is fruit only: two pineapples reduced for an hour with two sugars until the weight drops to about 590 g. That number matters, because a wetter filling blows out of the pastry in the oven.
Taiwanese · Sweet
Taiwanese Pineapple Cakes With a Jammy Fruit Filling
Pineapple cooked down with rock sugar and maltose until the fibres turn clear, then wrapped in a cream cheese shortcrust and baked in moulds. The filling has to be weighed, not guessed.
- Prep210 min
- Cook18 min
- Serves35
- LevelMedium
Ingredients
| 1700 g | pineapple flesh , from two large pineapples, peeled |
| 180 g | rock sugar |
| 100 g | maltose |
| 240 g | butter , softened |
| 310 g | cake flour |
| 57 g | egg , beaten, about one egg |
| 25 g | icing sugar |
| 40 g | milk powder |
| 20 g | ground almond |
Method
- Cut the soft pineapple flesh into small pieces and blitz the tough core in a blender so no hard fibre survives.
- Put all the fruit in a heavy pan with the rock sugar and maltose and cook over medium-low heat, stirring often.
- Once most of the liquid has gone, drop the heat to its lowest setting and keep going for about an hour in total, until the mixture holds together in a mass.
- Cool the filling, then chop through it with the back of a knife. This breaks the long fibres and gives the filling its jammy texture.
- Weigh the filling. It should come to roughly 590 g. Divide into 35 pieces of 16 to 17 g each.
- Beat the butter with the icing sugar until pale, add the egg a little at a time, then mix in the milk powder and ground almond.
- Sift in the cake flour and fold, then press the dough together on the counter and rest it, wrapped, for 30 minutes.
- Divide the pastry into 35 pieces of 19 to 20 g, flatten each into a cup, add a filling ball and close it up.
- Press each cake into a square mould and bake at 180C for 10 minutes, turn them over and bake for another 8 minutes.
Notes
- If the filling weighs much more than 590 g it still holds water, and the cakes will burst. Cook it longer.
- Turning the cakes halfway gives both faces the same flat, even colour.
Ratios and technique checked against 水之眸 on Douguo (正宗台式土凤梨酥（自制100%纯凤梨馅）). The method here is written by Stellaok and the illustration is ours; no text or photograph from the source is reproduced.