Pineapples are the flavour of the month at the moment, helped by the fact that Morrisons have them on offer - truly huge pineapples for a little over one British pound. I must admit that I have a taste for pineapple, as much as I have a taste for anything fruity, but they are a real bind to prepare. Sorting out the inedible core and then sorting out the peel generally takes a while and ends up with much juice on worksurfaces, hands and other places that you didn't mean to get juicy (clothes, the floor, etc. etc.). Sometimes you wonder whether it's worth the effort.
With this in mind AJ noticed that Lakeland are advertising a pineapple peeler in their latest catalogue so she decided that she wanted one. I looked at it and decided instantly that it probably wouldn't work and wasn't worth the few pounds of outlay. As usual, she completely ignored this and ordered it anyway alongside a bunch of toilet-related stuff...
Last week the bundle of plastic "goodies" arrived and a pineapple was bought to test it out. Now, despite the fact that AJ bought this device, it turned out that I was the lucky guinea-pig chosen to test it out. I did so and was surprised at how well it worked. So much so that I thought I'd phograph the process and blog it the next time. So, here we go.
First of all, chop off the top of the pineapple and decide which size of cutter to use (there are 3). Then attach the handle to the top of the cutter and start on the pineapple.
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| Pineapple & peeler ready to go |
Note that the cutter has two sets of "blades". One is in the middle - it takes out the core as you cut through the fruit. The second is on the outside edge of what is a slightly corkscrew shaped part of the device. The turning action gently cuts into the soft fruit on the outside edge whilst at the same time taking the blade further down into the fruit.
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| Peeler part way in - a bit wonky but getting there... |
So, midway through the process you've dug into the pineapple. Then comes the clever bit on the user's part... You have to work out roughly when you're near the bottom of the pineapple. If you don't then you end up going through the bottom of it and juice will flow out of the bottom of the hole - that's what happened to me the first time. Not a total disaster but it can be messy.
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| The finished product |
Staying above the bottom of the fruit you then simply lift up the whole device. This should bring out the pat of the fruit that you want to eat.
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| Leaving the waste and juice... |
It also leaves the core and some juice inside the pineapple. I poured the juice into a glass and drank it. Lovely.
An important part of the process is choosing the right blade of 3 in the first place. Too small a blade leaves edible fruit inside the pineapple, too large means you would have to trim the fruit once extracted (kind of defeating the object of the exercise). So, pick carefully peelers!
