Fruit Preparation for Fruit Pasta
The fruit represents about 50% of the fruit paste. It is obvious but its preparation is essential.
Often we will tend to focus on baking the dough at the expense of the rest.
How many degrees, how much Brix Scale , how much glucose but little question about the fruit.
Serious mistake that we will repair.
The fruit is the determining element of the fruit paste. Without a proper fruit base it is impossible to make a dough worthy of the name.
The choice of fruits is dictated by a few key points:
- Maturity
- Taste
- The colour
Maturity
The maturity of the fruit is important because it conditions the sugar content in the fruit and its natural acidity. Remember that in the development of our fruit paste, the acidity introduced at the beginning of cooking by the fruit will naturally favor the formation of invert sugar which will have the effect of keeping a soft dough and therefore fight against crystallization.
A slight acidity will act as a flavor enhancer especially on red fruits.
However we must not lose sight of either too acid, our dough will eventually “rewarm”, ie after a few days the fruit paste will eventually ooze. Which is not the most beautiful effect.
There are no ideal fruits therefore when picking or buying, please alternate a fruit composition containing a portion of fruit a little young that will bring us a hint of acidity needed and fruits more mature that will balance the whole. A young fruit is also more loaded with pectin.
Avoid over-ripe fruits that bring only sugar and taste not always at the top.
We make a fruit paste, not recycling.
Respect for the season is fundamental.
Do not expect to make a fresh fruit dough with peaches in December.
Often picked green, they will have crossed half of the world by finishing ripening on the plane or the boat and arriving at a very expensive price on our markets.
Be patient, wait for the season and enjoy the fruits produced by our French producers who will naturally sip of sun and no kerosene.
Fruits that have been picked a few days or even hours before your purchase. Better go to visit the producers or pick them yourself. Only then will you have a fruit meet our stringent quality criteria.
Taste
The taste of the fruit is also necessarily very important in our preparations. Remember that much of this taste will disappear on cooking. Also choose fruit taste is better.
If during the purchase the fruits have a “fleet taste” as often with fruits coming from far away, give up your fruit paste. She will be missed anyway. Do not expect to make a product that is held with poor quality ingredients
The colour
Color also has an important role, it participates in our way of perceiving taste.
Our brains have long since understood that a strawberry was red and a lemon was yellow. Try making a fruit paste with yellow strawberries and another with red lemons. You will see, you will perceive the taste differently.
A pronounced color can strengthen the taste perception of fruits a little light in taste.
The viscosity of our preparation
We will not throw fruits like that directly into our cauldron, it will have to prepare a little all.
Transform the whole in the form of puree because unlike jam, there is no piece in the fruit paste.
We will therefore puree our fruits.
This operation will allow us to adjust certain parameters and to become aware of some others.
Wash the fruit carefully, being careful not to introduce water inside. If you have to shell or peel your fruit, do it after washing, always in the trouble of not introducing water.
If there are pips, raspberries, currants … remove them. Only the flesh of the fruit interests us.
Carefully grind your fruit finely and do not hesitate to sprinkle with lemon to avoid oxidation.
To obtain a purée with the desired viscosity, we will introduce either apple or apple juice.
If your puree is too liquid, this is the case for example with cherries, add apple to thicken your preparation.
If, on the other hand, this one is too compact, add some apple juice to make it a bit more fluid.
Pass this puree to the Chinese stainless steel. There must be no solid element. No glitches as fine as they are, no skin. Just the flesh of the fruit.
Correct the consistency if necessary. It is essential that your mashed fruits have a certain consistency. It should not be too thick or too liquid. The ideal consistency should look like a canned industrial compote. What a reference!
Before starting your recipe, taste your mashed potatoes. It will tell you about the strength of its taste and its degree of acidity.
If the taste is a little weak, add 10% sugar and leave to rest in the refrigerator for a few hours in a film container. This will naturally enhance the aroma of your fruit.
The apple has several role in our mash, as we have seen it will allow to play on its viscosity but it will also bring 
pectin. The apple is a fruit naturally quite rich in pectin.
It will also slightly influence the final taste of our fruit paste giving it a more “round” taste.
In electronics one could compare the apple to a condenser, carpentry to a grater. It will soften the angles of taste. Give the “roundness” to taste. If the preparation is a little too acidic, the apple will also lower the pH.
The viscosity of the fruit puree will affect the cooking time of our fruit paste.
The more this puree will be liquid and the longer the cooking will be and the 107 ° or 78 ° Brix Scale hard to reach.
On the other hand, the thicker it will be, the faster it will reach 107 °.
It is important to keep this phenomenon in mind because the duration of cooking will directly affect the taste and color of our dough. It is not a question of prolonging the cooking too long because the puree a little liquid from the beginning to the trouble to take the good consistency. Cooking that is too long will inevitably lead to a loss of taste and a noticeable change in color. On the other hand, it is not necessary that at 107 ° the dough is too rigid what can happen if the puree was a little dry initially.
As we have seen throughout this article, fruit preparation is not an easy task.
It is capital in the elaboration of beautiful and good fruit paste.