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Pineapple Salad
Stir together 1 pint of chopped or shredded pineapple, and 2 pints of sweet salad dressing. Serve on lettuce leaves. Canned sliced pineapple or fresh pineapple can be used. When canned pineapple is used, the juice must be drained thoroughly from the fruit.
A two-ingredient fruit salad from the era when a "salad" could be mostly sweetened dressing. The proportions are the thing to look at before you start.
- The ratio is the problemTwo pints of dressing to one pint of fruit gives roughly twice as much sauce as pineapple, which reads as a dessert sauce rather than a salad. If you want a salad rather than a sauce, use about 1/2 to 3/4 cup of dressing per pint of drained fruit, added a spoonful at a time.
- "Sweet salad dressing"The recipe does not say what this is. In a book of this vintage it most likely means a cooked or boiled dressing thickened with egg and flour and sweetened with sugar, or a sweetened whipped-cream dressing. It is not vinaigrette. A modern stand-in is equal parts mayonnaise and lightly whipped cream with sugar to taste.
- Draining matters more than the recipe impliesCanned pineapple carries a great deal of syrup, and any that clings will thin an egg-thickened dressing to a soup. Drain in a sieve for at least ten minutes, then blot the pieces on a towel.
- Fresh pineapple and dairyRaw pineapple contains bromelain, which breaks down protein. Mixed with a cream or egg dressing it can turn thin and sometimes bitter as it stands, and it will not let gelatin set. Canned pineapple has been heated, which deactivates the enzyme.
- A pint of fruitA pint measure of chopped pineapple is 2 cups, roughly a 20 oz can once drained, or about half a medium fresh pineapple.
- Yield and servingWith the dressing reduced as above, this fills four to six lettuce cups. Assemble it just before it goes to the table; the leaves wilt quickly under a sweet dressing.