Pineapple tarts are one of the most beloved Chinese New Year goodies. Sweet, tangy pineapple jam paired with a buttery, melt-in-your-mouth biscuit — truly, what’s not to love? However, at an average of $25 a pop, pineapple tarts certainly don’t come cheap. Considering that its components were considerably simple, I wanted to test if it was more worth it to make them at home. After a quick search through the internet, I settled on this recipe from Rasa Malaysia.
Shopping for Ingredients
One of the best parts of making pineapple tarts are that many of the ingredients are pantry staples. This means that they’d already exist in most Singaporean households, and you needn't buy it just for the sake of making these! If you'd really rather not go through the hassle of picking out pineapples and having to butcher them yourself, you can use canned pineapples instead. Here’s a quick overview of what you’ll need to make pineapple tarts.
After running through the ingredients, I had to go out and buy pineapples and butter. Quality of the butter is key — you want to taste it in the tarts! While I did think of getting canned pineapples, I noticed that the supermarket was selling pineapple for $0.50 a piece. A piece! How could I resist? I picked up 4 good sized pineapples. Try to get a mix of unripe and ripe pineapples to get a balance in the jam.
Making the Pineapple Jam
If you’ve never made pineapple jam before, let me tell you — you’re in for a ride. It wasn’t until after I went through the process did I understand why many of my friends opted to buy ready-made pineapple jam for their tarts.
Firstly, cutting up the pineapples took a bit of time — don’t forget to core them, too. Leaving the core inside will make the jam much too fibrous, and rather unpleasant to eat. After which, blend them to create a purée, and transfer to a deep saucepan to reduce. Add your sugar slowly, tasting and adjusting as you go along.
Make sure to stir it occasionally to ensure it doesn’t burn, something that I abided by religiously. It wasn’t anything too difficult, but having to stand by the stove the entire period was a rather tedious process. I had to check on the mixture every few minutes or so to ensure that it was alright. The entire process took me close to 2 hours before I noticed the deep golden hue that is characteristic of pineapple jam.
The mixture needs to be sticky and thick before it is taken off the stove. I left it to cool in the fridge while I started work on the tarts.
Making the Tart
Now for the easy part. As someone who knows her way around the kitchen (to a certain extent), the tarts were not complicated in the least. Remember to take your butter out in advance, as the recipe calls for softened butter, which will make it easier to incorporate into the flour. I took it out during the later stage of the pineapple jam making process.
The mixture seemed a little separated at first, but don’t give up! It’s only the beginning — as you knead it, the dough will slowly form. It took about 15 minutes before I started to see it come together. The pictures above show how it should look. It seemed a little wet to me, so I opted to chill it in the fridge for about 15 minutes before I proceeded to work with it.
Assembly Time
Afterward, I had to roll the pineapple jam into balls. By now, the pineapple jam would have cooled and hardened slightly. They formed into balls easily. Then, roll out the pastry and cut out circles. In hindsight, having a circular cookie cutter would’ve made things a lot faster, but since I didn’t have that, I cut the circles out with a knife. They weren’t quite as perfect as I had hoped for, but they’d do.
Proceed to place one ball into the pastry, and roll it up. While some may prefer to just leave it as is, I followed in the footsteps of the recipe, choosing to fashion my pineapple tarts into little logs. The first few may have been a little bit too big, especially since I had no reference point (no pineapple tarts at home yet, unfortunately). However, you’ll get the hang of it along the way.
Preheat the oven to 180°C. While the oven is heating up, give the tarts an egg wash, The recipe called for a mix of egg yolk and condensed milk to make the tarts extra glossy, but I didn’t want to open an entire tin of condensed milk just to use half a tablespoon of it. Milk has the same effect, so I swapped it out for fresh milk which I had on hand.
Pop the tarts in the oven for 20–25 minutes, or until it develops a pale golden brown colour. I left them for about 23 minutes and they were perfect. Remember to leave them to cool! I got a little bit greedy and scoffed one down a mere minute or two out of the oven — burning the roof of my mouth in the process. 10/10 would not recommend this to anyone.
Final Thoughts
What a journey it has been! The entire process took a little over 3 hours, and it was tiring. However, I really do think it is much cheaper and definitely more worth it to make your own pineapple tarts at home. Taste is important, and I'm happy to say that these tastes pretty good — especially considering this was my first attempt. Though the pastry was a little too thick and a little crumbly — a result of my poor rolling skills — the taste of the butter shone through (I used Lurpak, y'all).
One of the best things about making it yourself is that you can control the sweetness in the jam. I’m not a fan of overly sweet things, and being able to personalise the jam to my taste was definitely a plus. Homemade pineapple jam really does have a special quality to it, not just in taste, but in texture as well. You'll still have some fibres in the jam, which actually gives it a nice bite.
In terms of cost, I only spent around $6 in total, factoring in the items I didn’t have at home. However, even if one had to buy everything, I’d reckon it would cost around $15. It’s still a lot cheaper than what you’d pay for a small jar of tarts from bakeries. Plus, you get double the amount of tarts!
All in all, it’s definitely more worth it to make your own pineapple tarts. Even if you’re short on time, there are many shortcuts you can take, such as using canned pineapples or ready-made pineapple jam from stores such as Phoon Huat. These options provide other time-effective and cost-effective ways to make your own tarts at home.
What are you waiting for? It’s time to get baking!
