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Grilled Pineapple rings brushed with butter and brown sugar come off the grill caramelized, juicy, and tasting like candy, and topping them with cold vanilla ice cream and warm caramel turned into the sundae Maddie and Lizzie begged for three nights in a row last week. If you love our mini pineapple upside down cupcakes, this is that same caramel and pineapple magic with zero baking.
It is the perfect excuse to keep the fire going after a batch of grilled corn ribs comes off.
Grilled Pineapple Quick Look
- 🕒 Prep Time: 10 minutes
- 🌡️ Cook Time: 10 minutes
- ⏳ Total Time: 20 minutes
- 🍽️ Serving: 8 servings (1 ring each)
- ⚡ Calories: 425kcal
- 🌶️ Flavor Profile: Caramelized, juicy pineapple with cold vanilla and buttery caramel
- ✋ Difficulty: Easy, even simpler than our perfect smash burgers
Quick Answer
Preheat the grill to 400 degrees F and oil the grates. Brush 1/2 inch thick pineapple rings with melted butter on both sides, sprinkle them with brown sugar, and grill them in a single layer for 3 to 5 minutes per side until they are tender with light char lines. Put one warm ring in each bowl, top it with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, drizzle with caramel sauce, and serve immediately.
Jump to:
- Grilled Pineapple Quick Look
- Quick Answer
- Why This Recipe Works
- Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- Key Ingredients
- Variations and Substitutions
- How to Make Grilled Pineapple
- Recipe Tips & Tricks
- Serving Ideas and Suggestions
- Grilled Pineapple FAQs
- Other Recommended Fruity Dessert Recipes
- Easy Grilled Pineapple Sundae (With Caramel and Vanilla Ice Cream)
Why This Recipe Works
Click to see the technique science
- The grill concentrates the sweetness. High heat drives off some of the pineapple’s water and caramelizes its natural sugar, so every ring comes off the grates tasting sweeter and more intense than it went on.
- Butter plus brown sugar builds a candy crust. The butter carries the brown sugar right into the surface of the fruit, where it melts and toasts into a thin caramelized shell with those beautiful char lines.
- Brown sugar beats white sugar here. The molasses in brown sugar browns faster and deeper than plain sugar, which is what gives the rings that toffee flavor in under 10 minutes of grilling.
- Grilling tames the acidity. Heat mellows the sharp, tangy bite fresh pineapple can have, so even the kids who claim they do not like pineapple go back for seconds.
- Warm fruit makes the ice cream work harder. The hot ring starts melting the vanilla ice cream on contact, creating that creamy sauce that runs into every groove of the pineapple. That contrast is the whole sundae.
- Half inch rings are the sweet spot. Thick enough to stay juicy in the middle, thin enough to heat through and char before they dry out, and sturdy enough to hold a scoop of ice cream on top.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- It is a 20 minute dessert that tastes like a resort splurge, and the grill does almost all of the work.
- Five simple ingredients, and if you want to go full homemade, a scoop of our no churn vanilla ice cream on top is unbeatable.
- It feeds eight people at once, so the whole cookout gets dessert at the same time, warm, cold, crunchy, and creamy in one bowl.
Key Ingredients
Five ingredients, one grill, and dessert is handled. Here is what each one brings to the bowl.
- Fresh Pineapple: One whole pineapple, peeled, cored, and cut into 1/2 inch rings. Pick one that smells sweet at the base and gives slightly when pressed. Golden skin beats green every time.
- Butter: Three tablespoons, melted. It keeps the fruit from sticking, carries the brown sugar, and adds that rich, toasty flavor to the crust.
- Brown Sugar: Just 2 1/2 tablespoons coats every ring. The molasses in it caramelizes fast and deep, turning the surface of the pineapple into candy.
- Vanilla Ice Cream: A 1 1/2 quart tub covers all 8 sundaes. Any creamy vanilla works, or go over the top with our no churn chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream.
- Caramel Sauce: Three quarters of a cup, about 1 1/2 tablespoons per sundae. Warm it slightly so it drizzles like the topping on our caramel apple dump cake.
See recipe card for exact quantities.
Variations and Substitutions
This sundae is a template, and it is very hard to mess up. A few favorite spins:
- Cinnamon toast: Add a pinch of cinnamon to the brown sugar before coating the rings for a churro style crust.
- Pina colada: Top with toasted coconut flakes and a splash of coconut cream, then pour everyone a glass of our coconut pineapple lemonade to match.
- Hot honey heat: Swap the caramel for hot honey and a tiny pinch of flaky salt. Sweet, spicy, and completely addictive.
- Lighter swap: Trade the ice cream for our 3 ingredient no churn frozen yogurt and skip the caramel for a fresher finish.
- Sundae bar: Set out chopped pecans, maraschino cherries, whipped cream, and chocolate sauce and let everyone build their own.
- Rum sauce for the grown ups: Warm the caramel with a splash of dark rum and a pat of butter for a bananas foster style drizzle, adults only.
How to Make Grilled Pineapple
- Preheat the grill to 400 degrees F and lightly oil the hot grates so the pineapple does not stick. Lay the pineapple rings on a tray, brush melted butter evenly over both sides of every ring, then sprinkle the brown sugar over both sides so each piece is lightly and evenly coated.
- Arrange the rings directly on the hot grates in a single layer, leaving a little space between them. Grill for 3 to 5 minutes, then turn each ring and cook for another 3 to 5 minutes.
- Pull the pineapple when it is warmed through, tender, and marked with light char lines. The sugar should look glossy and caramelized, not burned.
- Transfer one warm ring to each of eight bowls, top each with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, and drizzle about 1 1/2 tablespoons of caramel sauce over every sundae. Add any extra toppings you like and serve immediately while the pineapple is warm and the ice cream is cold.
Recipe Tips & Tricks
- Buy a ripe pineapple. Smell the base, it should be sweet and tropical. If it smells like nothing, it will taste like nothing, and the grill cannot fix an unripe pineapple.
- Cut even 1/2 inch rings. Even thickness means every ring hits tender and caramelized at the same time instead of some drying out while others stay cold in the center.
- Oil the grates, not just the fruit. The brown sugar coating wants to stick. Hot, clean, oiled grates are what give you clean flip and pretty char lines.
- Watch the sugar, not the clock. Glossy and golden is perfect, black and bitter is 60 seconds too long. Stay close for the second flip.
- Warm the caramel first. Ten seconds in the microwave turns it from a thick clump into a drizzle that ribbons over the ice cream.
- Scoop the ice cream ahead. Pre-scoop onto a chilled tray in the freezer so sundae assembly takes 30 seconds, the same party trick we use for our ice cream bars.
- Use up the extra pineapple. Chop any leftover grilled rings into our fruit salsa with cinnamon chips for round two tomorrow.
Serving Ideas and Suggestions
This is the dessert course of a backyard feast, because the grill is already hot. We serve it after smoked spatchcock chicken or a platter of cilantro lime grilled ribeye steaks, and the rings go on the grates the minute the meat comes off.
For the full cookout spread, round out the table with a watermelon feta salad and a pan of smoked mac and cheese before the sundaes land.
Hosting adults? Pour a round of our kiss on the lips mango cocktails alongside, the tropical flavors are made for each other.
Serve the sundaes the second they are built. The first minute, when the warm pineapple is melting the edges of the ice cream and the caramel is sliding into the grooves, is the entire point. Spoons out, napkins ready.
Grilled Pineapple FAQs
Grill pineapple rings at 400 degrees F for 3 to 5 minutes per side, about 6 to 10 minutes total. The pineapple is done when it is warmed through, tender, and marked with light golden char lines. Thicker rings need the full time, and the brown sugar coating should look glossy and caramelized, not blackened.
Yes. Slice off the top and bottom, stand the pineapple up and cut away the skin and eyes, then slice it into 1/2 inch rings and punch out the tough center core with a small round cutter or paring knife. A corer tool makes quick work of it, and clean rings cook evenly and are much nicer to eat under ice cream.
You can. Canned rings are thinner and wetter than fresh, so pat them very dry, skip nothing on the butter and brown sugar, and grill them hot and fast, about 2 to 3 minutes per side. Fresh pineapple gives you better texture and char, but canned makes a great shortcut version of grilled pineapple sundaes.
The melted butter keeps the fruit from sticking and carries the brown sugar evenly across every ring, and the brown sugar caramelizes in the heat to build a thin, toffee flavored crust with deep golden grill marks. Pineapple grilled plain is good, but the butter and brown sugar combination is what makes it taste like dessert.
Toasted coconut, chopped pecans, maraschino cherries, whipped cream, chocolate sauce, and a pinch of flaky salt are all winners on a grilled pineapple sundae. A dash of cinnamon in the brown sugar, a spoonful of rum caramel for the adults, or a scoop of coconut ice cream in place of vanilla are easy upgrades too.
Grilled pineapple is best warm off the grill, but you can grill the rings a day ahead and keep them covered in the fridge. Rewarm them on the grill or in a skillet for a minute or two before building the sundaes so the ice cream still melts against warm fruit. Leftover rings keep up to 3 days and are great chopped over yogurt or burgers.
Want one more fruit dessert that feeds a crowd with barely any work? Our easy berry cobbler is the oven answer to this grill classic.
💛 From our kitchen to yours, Jason, Maddie & Lizzie.
We’re a dad and his girls making real food with real butter, real sugar, and a lot of laughing. Pull up a chair, you’re family here.
Easy Grilled Pineapple Sundae (With Caramel and Vanilla Ice Cream)
Ingredients
- 1 fresh pineapple peeled, cored, and cut into 1/2 inch thick rings
- 3 tablespoons butter melted
- 2 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1 1/2 quarts vanilla ice cream
- 3/4 cup caramel sauce
- cooking oil for the grill grates
Instructions
- Preheat the grill to 400 degrees F. Once it is hot, lightly coat the grill grates with oil to help prevent the pineapple from sticking.cooking oil
- Place the pineapple rings on a tray or large plate. Brush melted butter evenly over both sides of every ring, then sprinkle the brown sugar over both sides so each piece is lightly and evenly coated.1 fresh pineapple, 3 tablespoons butter, 2 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
- Arrange the pineapple rings directly on the hot grill grates in a single layer, leaving a little space between them. Grill for 3 to 5 minutes, then turn each ring over and cook for another 3 to 5 minutes. The pineapple is ready when it is warmed through, tender, and marked with light char lines.
- Using tongs, transfer one warm pineapple ring to each of eight serving bowls. Immediately place one scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of or beside each ring so the ice cream begins to soften against the warm fruit.1 1/2 quarts vanilla ice cream
- Drizzle about 1 1/2 tablespoons of caramel sauce over each sundae, dividing the sauce evenly among the eight bowls. Add any optional toppings you prefer, then serve immediately while the pineapple is warm and the ice cream is cold.3/4 cup caramel sauce
Notes
Cut the rings an even 1/2 inch thick so they cook at the same rate. Thinner rings dry out, thicker ones stay cool in the middle.
Warm the caramel sauce for a few seconds in the microwave so it drizzles instead of clumping on the cold ice cream.
No grill? A grill pan over medium high heat works with the same timing, and canned pineapple rings work in a pinch, just pat them very dry first.
Grilled pineapple is best fresh, but leftover rings keep in the fridge for up to 3 days and are great chopped over yogurt, oatmeal, or even burgers.
Nutrition
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