Sainsbury's was not my friend this week and supplied every kind of dried fruit there is except raspberries. What did I need? Raspberries, naturally. You see, George has requested white chocolate and raspberry cookies (recipe and details to follow soon). Alas, this week's little project was not to be straight forward...
Take 1
I decided to buy fresh raspberries, assuming I'd figure it out once I was home. I was a bit wary, however, as I've never made cookies with fresh fruit and was worried they may add too much moisture to the mixture.
(If anyone can correct me here, feel free to comment or message me your recipe, would be interested to know!)
So after much research, a very helpful gardening website finally supplied a method for drying fruit I was happy with. The instructions said dehydrate the raspberries for 10 hours at 100'F (40'C ish). However, I live in a house with 5 other people, so monopolising the oven all day isn't really plausible. I cranked the heat up to 70'C, thinking they may take a little less time without cooking the raspberries. In the meantime, however, the kitchen was filled with the pleasant aroma of warm raspberries for the day.
Verdict? Fail. Epic fail. The raspberries still took 10 hours and I learned that the final hour is crucial. I had checked the raspberries every hour on the hour all day and at the 9th hour they were looking good, by the 10th they were burnt to a crisp.
Take 2:
Made a little trip down to Tesco Express to pick up pack number 2 of raspberries. (Actually, that's a fib, my housemate picked them up for me as he was going anyway.) I opened the pack ready to start dehydrating and they were mouldy! Failure rears it's ugly head again...
Most sane bakers would call it quits at this point... But sanity makes life dull... roll on attempt number 3!
Take 3:
Non-mouldy raspberries: check
Oven, 70'C: check
Baking tray & grate to place over: check
Verdict? Success! I now have a container of dried raspberries ready for my cookies - finally! (George will be excited by this news I'm sure!)
The raspberries only took about 6 hours in the end with the oven on 70'C and with space for the air to reach all around the fruit - some of the smaller ones were ready at about 4 hours, the last few large ones took the full 6. They have the texture of raisins. I place my cooling rack on top of a baking tray to create my grate and balanced the raspberries on top - I checked them every hour (every 1/2 hour once they started to dehydrate fully) replacing any that had shrunk and fallen through the gaps.
These are great for baking (but more on that tomorrow!) but also, they're really a tasty snack. Easy for kids' lunches or for all nighters in the library through exam period! Obviously, it's quicker and easier to simply buy pre-dried fruit from the supermarket, but if you find some strawberries in your fridge that are near their sell by date, this is a great way to make sure you don't waste them - or that you can use them out of season.
Tomorrow, I will be making raspberry and white chocolate cookies. I'll actually be making them with dairy free ingredients (including the chocolate) but the recipe will work for dairy free or not.
Click here to find out how to dehydrate fruit
I decided to buy fresh raspberries, assuming I'd figure it out once I was home. I was a bit wary, however, as I've never made cookies with fresh fruit and was worried they may add too much moisture to the mixture.
(If anyone can correct me here, feel free to comment or message me your recipe, would be interested to know!)
So after much research, a very helpful gardening website finally supplied a method for drying fruit I was happy with. The instructions said dehydrate the raspberries for 10 hours at 100'F (40'C ish). However, I live in a house with 5 other people, so monopolising the oven all day isn't really plausible. I cranked the heat up to 70'C, thinking they may take a little less time without cooking the raspberries. In the meantime, however, the kitchen was filled with the pleasant aroma of warm raspberries for the day.
Verdict? Fail. Epic fail. The raspberries still took 10 hours and I learned that the final hour is crucial. I had checked the raspberries every hour on the hour all day and at the 9th hour they were looking good, by the 10th they were burnt to a crisp.
Take 2:
Made a little trip down to Tesco Express to pick up pack number 2 of raspberries. (Actually, that's a fib, my housemate picked them up for me as he was going anyway.) I opened the pack ready to start dehydrating and they were mouldy! Failure rears it's ugly head again...
Most sane bakers would call it quits at this point... But sanity makes life dull... roll on attempt number 3!
Take 3:
Non-mouldy raspberries: check
Oven, 70'C: check
Baking tray & grate to place over: check
Verdict? Success! I now have a container of dried raspberries ready for my cookies - finally! (George will be excited by this news I'm sure!)
The raspberries only took about 6 hours in the end with the oven on 70'C and with space for the air to reach all around the fruit - some of the smaller ones were ready at about 4 hours, the last few large ones took the full 6. They have the texture of raisins. I place my cooling rack on top of a baking tray to create my grate and balanced the raspberries on top - I checked them every hour (every 1/2 hour once they started to dehydrate fully) replacing any that had shrunk and fallen through the gaps.
These are great for baking (but more on that tomorrow!) but also, they're really a tasty snack. Easy for kids' lunches or for all nighters in the library through exam period! Obviously, it's quicker and easier to simply buy pre-dried fruit from the supermarket, but if you find some strawberries in your fridge that are near their sell by date, this is a great way to make sure you don't waste them - or that you can use them out of season.
Tomorrow, I will be making raspberry and white chocolate cookies. I'll actually be making them with dairy free ingredients (including the chocolate) but the recipe will work for dairy free or not.
Click here to find out how to dehydrate fruit
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