A close cousin to our Vanilla Wafer Homemade Banana Pudding recipe, our Vanilla Wafer Pudding With Pineapple is just as delicious with a sunshiney sweetness to boot.
But also in this post, you’ll learn:
- How easy it is to make a pudding custard from scratch
- How to make a perfect meringue with ingredients you have on hand
Substitute for Bananas…
Crushed pineapple is an excellent substitution for banana and the light sweet flavor is perfectly complemented by the homemade custard. This is great when folks don’t care for bananas or if you don’t have any on hand since canned pineapple is nice and shelf stable. Banana pudding aficionados don’t skip a beat when you place this before them, either. My kids can attest to that – and they usually don’t like pineapple but they love this pudding!
Now let’s make some Vanilla Wafer Pudding with Pineapple
The Ingredients You’ll need for this Vanilla Wafer Pudding are:
Vanilla Wafers, Flour, Milk, Sugar, Crushed Pineapple, Eggs, Salt, and vanilla.
What Vanilla Wafers should I use?
My mother says you have to buy name brand Nilla wafers and I do agree with her, they really are the best. However, if my budget doesn’t allow, I have no problem with buying generic at 50% of the cost of name brand. Once you drown them in this yummy pudding, no on will know the difference unless you tell them.
To begin making your custard, crack and separate your eggs, whites in one bowl and yolks in the other.
Don’t let ANY of those yolks slip into your whites
It is important that you not get any yolks in your whites because we are going to whip those up into a meringue later and if they have yolks in them, it won’t work. However, if you do get yolks in them, you can just go ahead and leave the merginue off and serve it plain or with a whipped cream topping as well.
In a medium saucepot, combine your milk, flour, sugar, and eggs.
Put this over medium heat and stir constantly until it is smooth, creamy, and thickened.
This will probably take 10-15 minutes so you can use this time to call your Mama!
Once that is all thick and creamy and delicious, pour in your vanilla.
Yum diddly custard pudding!
Place half of the vanilla wafers in the bottom of an 8×8 baking dish.
Spread half of the crushed pineapple (undrained) over this.
Pour half of the custard/pudding over.
Add the rest of the wafers.
The rest of the crushed pineapple…
and the rest of the custard/pudding.
How to Make Your Meringue
Place egg whites in a perfectly clean mixing bowl.
Tips About Making Your Meringue topping for Vanilla Wafer Pudding
Your mixing bowl has to be totally clean because if there is any greasy residue it will keep the meringue from setting up.
The last time I showed some cracked eggs there was a whole long conversation in the comments about whether or not folks should leave that little white part in. This is an easy one for me – I’m too busy cooking supper to fret over a natural part of the egg but if it bothers you, by all means fish it out. When you find something so easy to change that will just right your world in some way, by all means, change it! 🙂
And remember NO egg yolks in here or the meringue won’t work.
To make meringue:
- Beat egg whites with an electric mixer until soft peaks form. This means, when you pull the beaters out of it, there is a peak of meringue sticking up where the beaters were and it collapses down a little after you remove the beaters.
- Add sugar. Beat until still peaks form. This means, when you pull the beaters out of it, there is a peak of meringue sticking up where the beaters were and it stays sticking up.
- You can see photos of making a meringue on this post.
Spread the meringue over the top of your pudding, taking care to make sure it touches the sides of the pan on all sides.
This prevents it from pulling back from the sides while it bakes.
Place in a 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes, or just until the meringue is browned. Check it often while cooking.
I prefer to serve this immediately while it is still warm but you can wait a bit or even serve it cold later, but please try warm and fresh first 🙂
Before you dig in, take a moment to close your eyes, bow your head, and give thanks for all of your blessings.
Enjoy 🙂
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup sugar or Swerve
- 1/3 cup all purpose flour
- 3 egg yolks
- 2 cups milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- dash salt
- 1 box vanilla wafers
- 20 ounce can crushed pineapple undrained
Meringue
- 3 egg whites
- 1/4 cup sugar
Instructions
- Place egg yolks, milk, 1/2 cup sugar, flour, and salt in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stirring constantly, cook until thickened - about 15-20 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
- Place half of wafers in bottom of 8x8 baking dish. Spread 1/2 of pineapple on top. Cover with 1/2 of custard. Repeat.
- Place egg whites in clean mixing bowl and beat with electric mixer until soft peaks form (see post for more clarification on this). Add sugar. Beat again until stiff peaks form. Spread over top of pudding and take care to make sure the merginue touches the sides all around. Place in 350 oven until top is lightly browned, about 15 minutes.
- Best if served warm.
Notes
Nutrition
You may also like these recipes:
Pineapple Upside Down Cake Super Moist
Chocolate Vanilla Wafer Pudding
Honest To Goodness, Old Fashioned Bread Pudding
“Integrity is Christlike character in work clothes.”
~Unknown. Submitted by Ashanti Hoskins. Click here to read more or submit your own.
Oh yum! Christy, I agree with you about the vanilla wafers. I have the Nabisco wafers to be of lesser quality and many wafers are broken. I have found the store and generic brands to have a good flavor and to be of good quality with fewer broken wafers.
I hope you get the chance to make it soon Patricia!!!
‘I got in a habit, which is easy to do, of looking for the negative.’ Me too, me too. Gonna make a practice of your experience now and strongly hope this would work with me too.
You can do it Tattie!!!
My mother used pineapple all the time if the bananas were too green and the kids just couldn’t wait:)
I wonder how coconut would be? Or, all three? It would be a Piña Colada pudding!
Hmmm. Now I’ll have to try it. I love those the flavors combined or alone. Vanilla pudding and vanilla wafers never fail to be wonderful. The fruit merely elevates it.
Oohh, let me know how it turns out if you try it!!
Banana pudding and really any pudding is one of my comforting favorites. If you want to level up on the pudding game, use pepperidge farm chessmen instead of nilla wafers.. You will be mind blown 🙂
I will have to give that a try Kylie, thanks for sharing!!!
Thank you for sharing about attitude. I am almost 72 years old and I have developed some very unhappy feeling. Your message helped me. Now I will make some pineapple pudding
Thank you for sticking with me and reading it Martha!! I hope you enjoy the pudding!!
I have a question Christy. I am living the gluten free lifestyle and have recently bought a box of gluten free vanilla wafers. Not sure how they taste her but want to try your recipe with them. Should I substitute cornstarch for the flour?
Thanking you in advance,
Wondering about question about using oven if you use whipped cream instead of meringue? Not a fan of meringue…do you still heat it up before adding whipped cream? You don’t want whipped cream to melt. Thinking heat it some and let it cool.
Does it need cooking at all?
It doesn’t need cooking at all. The pudding is cooked so you’re good to go. You can put the whipped topping on while it is warm or even cover it and refrigerate until cold and then top.
Thank you. Sounds so good.
Christy, i have been making pineapple pudding for years. I use graham crackers instead of nilla wafers.
Isn’t it wonderful Mary!?! I will have to try it using the graham crackers and see which way I like it best. Thank you for sharing that!!
I ALWAYS remove that white stuff from the egg. Anybody else? This sounds so good. My hubby would love it.
Mom and Daddy worked in the cotton mills of Gastonia and we never threw anything out that could be warmed up or used to make something else. Mom made this, banana or strawberry pudding every Sunday with home made custard. I still make it just like she did and everyone who tries it LOVES it. Thank you for sharing recipes that bring memories to mind and are so good!!!!