13.9.11

Fruit Leather Time!

Having never done this before and going loosely off information from my mom I'm jumping head first into making some fruit leather....at 9 o:clock at night.  What am I thinking? 

Well I don't pretend to be the sharpest tool in the shed but at least I'll be a dull tool with yummy fruit leather...if it turns out.  If it doesn't I'll just be a dull tool.  Oh dear.

Alrighty, let's get this leather party started!

Set your oven to 120 celsius if possible, mine is digital and I could only go as low as 170.  To compensate for this and to make sure I was drying my fruit not cooking it, I propped a spoon in the door of the oven to keep it slightly ajar.  Next, line your baking sheet(s) with wax paper.


Next pick some fruits that you want in your leather.  I went with my recent freshly picked berries and threw in an apple to help soften the tartness of the berries. 

I wasn't sure how much whole fruit I would need for the amount of fruit leather my oven can handle so I started small. I don't have a dehydrator but I've been assured that an oven is the next best thing.

1 cup of blueberries
1.5 cups of blackberries
1 cored apple
1/4 of a cup huckleberries


Next, toss all your fruit into the food processor - use this instead of a blender as you still want to keep some of the chunks in the fruit. 


Give it all a good whirl until any large bits are broken down but you still have some texture.


Now spread it out on your wax paper.  Keep it thin, about 1/4 cm thick.


Now throw it in the oven for approx 2 hours.  I ended up keeping mine in for an extra 20 minutes.  Basically you want it to still be flexible but not wet.  I simply did the touch-test near the end of the two hours and found some parts were still a bit soft to the touch.  You don't want it to harden too much either as it can become brittle.  Nobody likes a brittle leather!

So now it's out of the oven and cooling.  In the morning I'm hoping it will have set enough to cleanly and easily pull it up from the wax paper and then I can see if it rolls up just like store bought fruit leathers!  If not, well, I've got a LOT more berries to go through so I'll make a second attempt tomorrow!