The Chocolate Covered Tropical Fruit That You May Like Better Than Strawberries

I love me some chocolate-dipped strawberries and appreciate how easy they are to make, but years ago I discovered that another fruit tastes even better when combined with chocolate. It happened on a trip to Iceland, of all places, where I ordered a bowl of ice cream, ignoring the fact that it was surprisingly chilly for July. I was served French vanilla with chocolate sauce, topped off with a few slices of fresh pineapple. (Iceland, interestingly enough, grows some of its own pineapples in greenhouses heated with geothermal energy.) The takeaway here is that the combination of pineapple and chocolate came as a surprise, but turned out to be amazing. It's something I still remember fondly many years later and have done my best to recreate it in various forms. Not only is it fantastic on ice cream or in a dessert fondue, but chocolate-dipped pineapple makes for the perfect semi-healthy indulgence.

So, why does pineapple work so well with chocolate? As with strawberries and raspberries, two fruits often paired with chocolate, it's all about flavor balance. You have a sweet, yet somewhat tangy fruit dipped in a smooth, creamy coating, and the results are pure magic. Of these three fruits, pineapple tends to be the tangiest, so there's more of a flavor contrast going on. This is why I find the pineapple-chocolate pairing so appealing. 

Dipping pineapple in melted chocolate isn't any more difficult than making chocolate-covered strawberries. There is more prep work involved, however, since you first need to pick a perfectly ripe pineapple. (Tip: if you squeeze it, it should feel firm, but not hard.) If you want to make your pineapple as sweet as possible, you might also want to store it upside-down in the fridge for a few days. Then comes peeling and coring the fruit (save those rinds to make tepache) and slicing it into rings. While you can leave the rings whole, you might want to cut them into halves, thirds, or quarters. Once all this is done, you'll be ready to dip.

For eight rings – the rough yield from cutting a large pineapple into half-inch slices — you'll need about one cup of chocolate chips and four teaspoons of coconut oil or shortening. First, pat the pineapple dry with a paper towel. Melt the chocolate and fat in the microwave in 20 to 30-second bursts, stirring between each one. Dip one or both ends of the pineapple into the chocolate, or rotate a whole ring to cover ½ to ¾. Let the excess drip off, then put the dipped pineapple on a pan lined with wax or parchment paper. Once you're done dipping the pineapple, refrigerate it for an hour or so to set the chocolate. Homemade chocolate-covered pineapple stays good in the fridge for up to three days, but the chocolate may soften after day one as the pineapple juices seep in.