Mould with pineapple motif, for flummery

Staffordshire, England, c.1790

Creamware

Private collection

In the early 1720s, Bradley had described pineapples as ‘Rarities from the West- Indies’, being ‘soft, tender and delicate’ and excelling ‘all the Fruits in the World in Flavour and Richness of Taste’. Once an emblem of the tropical and unobtainable, by the 1750s, the pineapple had asserted itself as chief ingredient of delicacies offered by exclusive confectioners and fashionable hosts. Wedgwood and other Staffordshire potteries catered for the pineapple craze by producing ceramic pineapple-shaped moulds (like these two), in which trompe l’oeil pineapple jelly or blancmange-like flummery was made in kitchens, both commercial and domestic.