![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
minoanmissEver since killing a Cuisinart by grinding dried fruit in it, I've been a bit leery of making more fruit bonbons. OTOH, I love the fruit bonbons and I love giving them away. So I was thinking, and thought about one of my favorite classes of ingredients, freeze-dried food.
The nice thing about freeze dried food is that its texture is friable, porous, and completely dry, so it's really easy to grind up. Meanwhile, dried fruits and vegetables have structures that have collapsed and become dense, and are held together with pectin and a certain residual amount of water, which makes grinding them up a difficult task with a sticky end result. Still, I wanted the chewiness of that pectin, so I modified the recipe to add some.
Rosehip Bonbons with Freeze Dried Fruit
2 cups dried rosehips, tea-cut
one 2oz package freeze dried pears
one 2oz package freeze dried grapes
one 2 oz package freeze dried pineapple
[next time I'll swap in freeze dried cherries for one of these]
1 cup sugar (I used half demarara) plus more for rolling
2 tsp freeze dried ginger
1 tsp mixed spice (I used TJ's Pumpkin Spice. It has lemon zest and cardamom in it. It's legitimately good.)
1/2 cup fruit pectin mix from Nuts.com (pectins are really brand specific. I'll try to experiment with other brands)
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp citric acid
This recipe requires a kitchen appliance which can reduce things to powder. Most food processors manage sand at best. I used to have a coffee grinder reserved for sweet ingredients, but it broke, so I used Wolf's ultra powerful blender.
Set up a really large bowl and a really large fine mesh strainer (strainer over bowl, obvs). Using whatever pulverizer is on hand, in whatever batches make sense, reduce the rosehips, freeze dried fruits and ginger, and sugar to fine powders and pass them through the strainer. Discard anything too large to pass through the strainer. Try not to cough. Set the bowl and its contents aside.
In a small saucepan, heat the water just to boiling (be careful not to boil any off). Sprinkle the pectin over, turn the heat all the way down to the lowest simmer, and leave for 5 minutes or so for the pectin to melt. (Use this time to clean up the fine fruit powder that settled everywhere.) When the pectin is melted, stir well to produce a thick goop, and add the spice, salt, and citric acid. (If you have no citric acid, replace 2 tbsp of the water with lemon juice.)
When well mixed, scrape the goop into the bowl of fruit powder and stir as well as you can to combine everything into a very thick sticky paste. Do not add more water. You will be tempted, but you can actually beat everything together if you keep at it. Once well mixed, scrape into an oiled container, seal airtight, and leave overnight (for all the fruit particles and pectin and water to commingle).
The next day, using a teaspoon or a teaspoon scoop, portion the mixture, roll into balls (dampening one's hands can be useful) and roll in coarse sugar, pressing gently to adhere. Arrange on a lined tray, cover with something porous, and leave overnight to dry until firm enough to hold their shape.
The nice thing about freeze dried food is that its texture is friable, porous, and completely dry, so it's really easy to grind up. Meanwhile, dried fruits and vegetables have structures that have collapsed and become dense, and are held together with pectin and a certain residual amount of water, which makes grinding them up a difficult task with a sticky end result. Still, I wanted the chewiness of that pectin, so I modified the recipe to add some.
Rosehip Bonbons with Freeze Dried Fruit
2 cups dried rosehips, tea-cut
one 2oz package freeze dried pears
one 2oz package freeze dried grapes
one 2 oz package freeze dried pineapple
[next time I'll swap in freeze dried cherries for one of these]
1 cup sugar (I used half demarara) plus more for rolling
2 tsp freeze dried ginger
1 tsp mixed spice (I used TJ's Pumpkin Spice. It has lemon zest and cardamom in it. It's legitimately good.)
1/2 cup fruit pectin mix from Nuts.com (pectins are really brand specific. I'll try to experiment with other brands)
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp citric acid
This recipe requires a kitchen appliance which can reduce things to powder. Most food processors manage sand at best. I used to have a coffee grinder reserved for sweet ingredients, but it broke, so I used Wolf's ultra powerful blender.
Set up a really large bowl and a really large fine mesh strainer (strainer over bowl, obvs). Using whatever pulverizer is on hand, in whatever batches make sense, reduce the rosehips, freeze dried fruits and ginger, and sugar to fine powders and pass them through the strainer. Discard anything too large to pass through the strainer. Try not to cough. Set the bowl and its contents aside.
In a small saucepan, heat the water just to boiling (be careful not to boil any off). Sprinkle the pectin over, turn the heat all the way down to the lowest simmer, and leave for 5 minutes or so for the pectin to melt. (Use this time to clean up the fine fruit powder that settled everywhere.) When the pectin is melted, stir well to produce a thick goop, and add the spice, salt, and citric acid. (If you have no citric acid, replace 2 tbsp of the water with lemon juice.)
When well mixed, scrape the goop into the bowl of fruit powder and stir as well as you can to combine everything into a very thick sticky paste. Do not add more water. You will be tempted, but you can actually beat everything together if you keep at it. Once well mixed, scrape into an oiled container, seal airtight, and leave overnight (for all the fruit particles and pectin and water to commingle).
The next day, using a teaspoon or a teaspoon scoop, portion the mixture, roll into balls (dampening one's hands can be useful) and roll in coarse sugar, pressing gently to adhere. Arrange on a lined tray, cover with something porous, and leave overnight to dry until firm enough to hold their shape.
no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 09:12 am (UTC)(Now I'm imagining using freeze-dried ginger plus regular ground ginger, moistened with some bottled ginger juice and jelled with pectin, to make ginger gummies...)
no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 05:01 pm (UTC)I get the freeze dried ginger from Penzey's, and omg, I love the ginger gummies idea!
no subject
Date: 2019-12-09 04:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 02:04 pm (UTC)I might make some chocolate truffles with my remaining ganache. I could make more macarons but I have not enough ganache for another batch. Baking problems!
no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 05:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 06:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 07:48 pm (UTC)Yeah, most pumpkin spice blends are made of sawdust and cloves. I happened to accidentally read the ingredients on TJ's, and was intrigueed by the lemon zest and cardamom, so I decided to give it a try. And it's well balalnced and actually delicious!
no subject
Date: 2019-12-08 07:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-09 04:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-11 05:16 am (UTC)I keep waffling over the idea. Can I clamp it tightly enoguh to the counter, will I be strong enough to turn it, etc, etc etc.
no subject
Date: 2019-12-12 06:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-09 07:13 pm (UTC)I have an old electric coffee grinder I use for some spices. I bet it would work for this as well.