Today we want to show you how to make pineapple flowers, which are a beautiful and edible garnish that looks fantastic on desserts and happen to be the perfect touch when celebrating your fourth anniversary!

Can you believe that those are made from pineapples? Neither could I the first time I saw them! Someone called them pineapple flowers, and I just assumed that they were the actual flowers that grew on pineapple plants. Nope. But back to why these are perfect for your fourth anniversary ~ the traditional fourth anniversary gift is fruit or flowers! You could order an edible arrangement, but why not make a flower from a fruit? Read on to find out how.

Materials and Tools

Other than the pineapple, it’s likely that you have everything you need to make these garnishes.

• one ripe pineapple
• sharp knife
• vegetable peeler (or tip of your knife)
• cutting board
• baking sheet with parchment paper or silpat
• muffin pan

How-to

• Preheat your oven to 225F and line the cookie sheet with either parchment paper or a silpat.
• Cut the top and bottom off of the pineapple, and then continue removing the pineapple’s rind. Use either the tip of a vegetable peeler or your knife (be careful), to cut out the remaining little spikes or “eyes” that are still in the fruit.
• Slice the pineapple as thin as possible, while trying to keep each slice whole. The thinner you make your slices, the quicker and more completely they will dry, and the better they will hold their shape as flowers.
• Place the slices on a cookie sheet and bake for about 30 minutes, or until the tops feel dry to the touch. Flip the slices and bake for another 30 minutes, until they are almost completely dry.
• Remove your slices from the oven and place them in an empty muffin tin so that the edges of the pineapple slices turn upwards. Keep them in the tin overnight, or for at least 8 hours to help them keep their shape. Or you can skip the muffin tin and make flat ones like Martha.
• Remove the flowers from the muffin tin and use them to decorate your favorite desserts! I served them on bowls of vanilla ice cream with freshly chopped pineapples and strawberries.

Tips & Tricks

• In the process of cutting out the pinapple’s eyes, you’re actually helping to create a flower shape in the pineapple (making it go in and out as if you were tracing petals). If you don’t have many eyes to cut out, you may find that your slices are almost perfectly round, if this is the case, you may want to make a few thin cuts around your slice to delineate petals.
• Some of my slices were a bit thin, so I found it helpful to use the convection setting on my oven because it seemed like the flowing air added my drying power.
• Likewise, the whole drying process make take a little bit longer and require more flips if your slices are on the thicker side…. I even found that it was helpful to pop my muffin tin of flowers back in the oven for a few minutes to further help with the drying process.
• I liked the idea of making flowers that had even more of a cup shape, so I used my mini muffin tin, but a regular-sized tin works well if you just want a bit of shape.

Since Calder loves pineapple and loves dried fruit, these flowers were the perfect little surprise on our anniversary! Plus, I loved that they looked so much like the yellow flowers in our little anniversary bouquet from the garden.