I found an old church cookbook while unpacking and realized it had some old family recipes in it so I had to try one! We lost Gram Kotula earlier this year and the minute I saw her Pineapple Cheese Mold recipe I knew I had to try it.
As you can see there are no exact measurements for some items so I consulted with my mom and decided a 16oz tub of cool whip, 20oz can of crushed pineapple, and 8oz block of cream cheese constituted the large options.
The first step in the recipe is dissolve gelatine in water. I went ahead and boiled the water first, then added the 2 envelopes of gelatine, and whisked it around a bit to dissolve.
Next I added the cream cheese and sugar and using a hand mixer beated the mixture until smooth. This took about 2 minutes.
Fold in the pineapple and cool whip in batches to make it easier to handle. (JUST FOLD IT IN!)
Once everything is evenly incorporated pick a vessel to use as your mold. I didn’t want to be boring so I picked a fancy bundt pan.
Before pouring the mixture into your vessel line it well with plastic wrap. This isn’t in Gram’s recipe but I thought it was a good idea and I’m glad I did.
Remove the stems and cut up a few maraschino cherries and line them on the bottom of the mold. Jess isn’t a fan so I only put cherries on half.
Pour the mixture into the mold and chill until firm.
Let’s talk about chill time. I left this chill for 24 hours and it didn’t really firm up. We are thinking that I used either too much cool whip or too much pineapple. The extra ingredients would make it harder for the gelatine to firm up. After 3 days it still wasn’t firm so I made the decision to throw the mold into the freezer. Boy am I glad I did!
After about 2 days in the freezer the mold was perfect. Definitely more frozen than set but cool whip doesn’t freeze hard so it still cut into nice slices. I couldn’t be happier with how this turned out and the flavor reminded me of my Gram so much!
I can’t wait to try this recipe again with a few revisions. If you give it a shot and change anything let us know!
Enjoy,
Dan
