Pineapple Platter

It’s the middle of winter here in Australia, and while Brisbane winters are mild, I’m missing the sunshine and fresh fruit of summer. Looking through some photos of our housewaerming last year, I spotted this very summery Pineapple Platter. Maybe those of you in the Northern Hemisphere enjoying their summer holidays could use the recipe sooner than I will. It’s a bizarre flavour combination and had a 70s or 80s feel to it, but somehow it works (and the platter has always got stripped whenever I’ve made it!

Ingredients
1 pineapple with the top still on
Glace cherries – looks much snazzier if you can get multiple colours!
Cheese – tasty, cheddar or something similar
Toothpicks

Procedure
1.  Slice the top off the pineapple – try to keep it as level as possible so it sits flat as the centre-piece.
2.  Slice the pineapple in half from top to bottom. Then slice each piece in half, and then in half again, to end up with 8 long wedges of pineapple.
3.  Carefully cut off the core and skin of each piece – keep the skin for the platter.
4.  Slice the pineapple pieces into mouthful-sized tasty morsels – place the pineapple straight back onto the piece of skin it came from.
5.  Slice the cheese into pieces that will fit on top of the pineapple morsels.
6.  Put a piece of cheese and glace cherry on top of each piece of pineapple, and put a toothpick through to hold it together.
7.  Place the top of the pineapple on the centre of a large round plate, and evenly space the pineapple strips around the top.
8.  Fill in the gaps with other fruit pieces, or nuts, or dried fruit, or whatever takes your fancy…

I’ll go back to pining for warmer weather now…