These Piña Colada Panna Cotta Pots will be the most talked-about dessert on your menu.

The Piña Colada Panna Cotta Pots are literally Summer in a little pot. Pineapple, coconut, cream and rum. It says it all, doesn’t it. The best part for me, is that they are so quick to make and a single recipe fills about 12 of these little pots. You can also make these desserts a day or two in advance and they will be happy to wait in the fridge for your guests.

Look, panna cotta is one of my favourites to eat so I would say I am a little biased. The ginger biscuits and pineapple concassé round off this dessert just perfectly. Ok, “concassé” is a cheffy word for chopped up vegetables or fruit.

Piña Colada Panna Cotta Pots

serves 12

For the Panna Cotta

Ingredients

500 ml cream

1 tin coconut cream

250 ml milk

150 g sugar

80 ml rum

6  sheets gelatin – softened in 125 ml water

seeds from 1 vanilla pod

pinch of salt

Method

Soak or bloom the gelatin leaves in tap water for about 10 – 15 minutes or until they are soft. In the meantime, pour the cream into a pot. Add the sugar, salt and vanilla and bring the cream to the boil. Just before it reaches boiling point, add the softened gelatin and stir until completely dissolved. Pour the cream mixture into a bowl and cool down while you make the ginger crumbs.

For the Ginger Crumbs

1 packet Baker’s Ginger Nuts

80 g butter – melted

Method

Place the ginger nuts in a food processor and blitz until you have fine crumbs. Add the melted butter and process until mixed. Use a teaspoon to spoon a layer in each little pot.

To make the little pots

Once the panna cotta mixture has cooled down, place in fridge for an hour. The mixture must not be set, just not being a liquid either. Fill each little pot ¾ with the panna cotta mix and place in fridge to set. Just before serving, make the pineapple concassé.

Pineapple Concassé

Ingredients

1 pineapple – peeled, cored and cut in tiny cubes

zest of 1 -2 limes

3-5 basil leaves – not too much, the idea is a subtle hint of basil

Method

Place all the ingredients for the concassé in a bowl and mix. Spoon onto the panna cotta mix just before serving.

For the pineapple flowers

Peel 1 pineapple and cut in very thin slices. Scatter some castor sugar on all the slices and place them in muffin trays. Press then down in the muffin pans so that they resemble flowers. Bake in oven at 100 C until they are completely dry.

Chef’s Notes

This dessert can also be made in a single pretty mould, use the ginger crumbs at the bottom and round off with the pineapple concassé and pineapple flowers.

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