Tag: pineapple

Posted on

Celeriac Slaw with Pineapple

image

Ahhhh summer! 🙂 The weather has been crazy! From 95 to 69 in two hours due to thunderstorms, then back up to hot the next day, after the early morning temps were in the low 50’s… So with the official start of pool season (Memorial Day) the grill has moved back to center stage for many, and we can never have enough ideas for sides to eat with all the great things that will be grilled up. And with the warm weather being here to stay, there won’t be much winter crop celery root available soon. So here, to ring in the changing season with one more glorious celeriac recipe, I made a salad, a slaw really, adding summery pineapple to make it more special. Even though this is a ‘slaw’, it is light and healthy, no heavy mayonnaise or heavy cream, but flavorful and perfect for that next summer picnic!

imageI have made a dressing with sour cream for this one, but use any creamy dressing you like. (Have also tried it with buttermilk)

imageIngredients

  • 1 medium celeriac (celery root)
  • 2 tbsp lemon juice
  • 1 cup fresh pineapple, cut into chunks
  • 1/2 cup sour cream
  • 1/4 cup apple cider or white wine vinegar
  • 1/4 cup chopped mixed herbs (such as parsley, chives, thyme)
  • 1 tsp mustard
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp fresh ground black pepper

Directions

  1. Clean and peel celeriac, then grate on the coarse side of a grater or use your food processor. Drizzle with lemon juice, toss add the pineapple and set aside.
  2. To make the dressing, mix the herbs, mustard, salt and pepper with the vinegar, then stir in the sour cream.
  3. Add the dressing to the celeriac, stir until well combined. Toss something on the grill to go along with it or make a yummy salad platter like I did here.

image

Copyright © 2012 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved

Posted on

Best way to cut up a pineapple

Stop buying those crazy gadgets, people!  There is, in no kitchen in the world, the need for a pineapple corer. Not only do you waste money on the tool, but you waste a whole bunch of yummy pineapple every time you cut one up. No No, nononono!
Here is a much better the best way to go about it, and all you need is a big cutting board, a bread knife (trust me, works the best) and, of course a ripe pineapple.
First you cut the ends off, like such…

image

Then proceed to slicing off just the outer layer, or most of the outer prickly layer…

image

Make sure you leave the prickly  ‘dimples’ in place, they provide a visual clue for the next step…

image

Notice how there is a patter to those ‘eyes’? Yes, they run in a spiral around your fruit. So cut out a few at a time, by holding the knife and cutting diagonally from one, then the other side of the dimples, so as to cut out a wedge containing the prickly bits.

image

And there is your pineapple! Imagine the waste if you had to cut down to the inner level and chuck all the rest?

image

The only thing left to do now is half, then quarter the pineapple, and cut the hard part off of the center as shown in the picture. Feel free to gnaw and chew on it, its yummy! You just can’t eat all of it, too hard.

And there you go. No more unnecessary waste!

Another thing I like to do, after the outer hard shell is cut off and discarded(since I don’t know where this little fruit’s been hanging around) get a pitcher and put all the diagonal/wedge cut pieces plus the center in it, fill with water and let rest a room temperature for at least 4 hours, then refrigerate. Makes yummy pineapple flavored water. Keeps in the fridge for 4 to 5 days.

Would be really yummy on some fresh cheese or yogurt…but we’ll have to make do with plain Kefir, since that’s all my fridge will give me at the moment…

Copyright © 2012 Simple Healthy Homemade. All rights reserved