carmelized pineapple

dear diary...
it's been a while since i last wrote. i won't get into it all, but suffice it to say that i haven't done a great deal of adventurous {or otherwise} cooking in the last little while. but now that i'm home, i am trying to get back into the swing of things. what better way to start than with dessert?

when i made this last night, though, it wasn't the first time. when i was in Calgary, one of the things that i needed to do was to make a cheesecake for Derek. every year, when our rival football teams {University of Michigan vs. Michigan State} play, my brother and i call it the Cheesecake Bowl, and whosoever team loses, has to make the other a cheesecake.

i've made too many cheesecakes in the last few years.

this year, i wanted to make one that mom could eat too, so i chose a no-bake, and therefore no-egg cheesecake. but i didn't want to limit us to cherry topping. not that i have anything against cherries, i just thought that there had to be a way to mix it up.

so, i made the cheesecake, and while it was in the refrigerator, i made some other toppings. and here's where it gets good. i toasted coconut {yum}, but the best idea was to take some pineapple, and bake it for a while with brown sugar, cinnamon and butter until it was perfectly carmelized. so, so good! all the toppings were laid out, including cherries, and everyone could pick what they wanted.

we ended up eating more of the cheesecake than we would have normally, however, trying the different combinations of toppings! i suppose that it was a necessary evil to do justice to the experiment.

last night, i thought i would try it again, to see if it was just a fluke.

it wasn't.