Pâte de Fruits (Fruit Paste/Fruit Jellies) (Part 1)

[pastrymama]

When I make pate de fruit I always let it cool completely, then I cover it with plastic wrap and store at room temperature. When I need some I just cut off the amount I need and cut it into pieces, roll in sugar and serve it. The uncut jelly has lasted for a couple of months in the pan and covered. It has never weeped out much or gotten moldy.

[John DePaula]

Ok, I located the passage in French Professional Pastry series v. 2. They were, in fact, the ones that said to dust immediately with granulated sugar to prevent a crust from forming.

But after reading through all of my references, I think dusting immediately or not is irrelevant. My problem is that I have packaged them too soon. You really need to leave them out, uncovered, open to air, for 3 - 4 days so that they dry out enough.

So, I really need to respect that drying time.

But I think that unless you have a special drying room, they will dry at different rates depending on the ambient moisture which will vary over the course of a year.

Therefore, it might be worth taking some measurements to figure out the percentage of weight loss necessary for pieces to be "sufficiently dry." I will try to keep some records the next few times to see, for example, how much the weight of 20 pieces changes during the drying time. If anyone is interested, I'll report back here.

Cheers.

[Kerry Beal]

Ok, I located the passage in French Professional Pastry series v. 2.  They were, in fact, the ones that said to dust immediately with granulated sugar to prevent a crust from forming.

But after reading through all of my references, I think dusting immediately or not is irrelevant.  My problem is that I have packaged them too soon.  You really need to leave them out, uncovered, open to air, for 3 - 4 days so that they dry out enough.

So, I really need to respect that drying time.

But I think that unless you have a special drying room, they will dry at different rates depending on the ambient moisture which will vary over the course of a year.

Therefore, it might be worth taking some measurements to figure out the percentage of weight loss necessary for pieces to be "sufficiently dry."  I will try to keep some records the next few times to see, for example, how much the weight of 20 pieces changes during the drying time.  If anyone is interested, I'll report back here.

Cheers.

←

I'm interested.

[gap]

Me too - I like the thinking as well

[John DePaula]

Ok, I located the passage in French Professional Pastry series v. 2.  They were, in fact, the ones that said to dust immediately with granulated sugar to prevent a crust from forming.

But after reading through all of my references, I think dusting immediately or not is irrelevant.  My problem is that I have packaged them too soon.  You really need to leave them out, uncovered, open to air, for 3 - 4 days so that they dry out enough.

So, I really need to respect that drying time.

But I think that unless you have a special drying room, they will dry at different rates depending on the ambient moisture which will vary over the course of a year.

Therefore, it might be worth taking some measurements to figure out the percentage of weight loss necessary for pieces to be "sufficiently dry."  I will try to keep some records the next few times to see, for example, how much the weight of 20 pieces changes during the drying time.  If anyone is interested, I'll report back here.

Cheers.

←

Drying Test

I allowed the Pates de fruits (PdF) to rest open to the air to dry for a total of about 4.5 days before packaging them in clear (almost airtight) acetate rounds. In the end, it will take several weeks at the earliest before we’ll know if this was sufficient to eliminate excess moisture. Here are the results of the drying test:

Executive Version:

The PdF lost about 3% of their initial weight over the course of the test. Presumably, this is moisture that would have been trapped in the box and allow the PdF to "weep" thereby melting the sugar coating and forming sugar syrup around the base.

Details:

I used round drying trays from a dehydrator. These are plastic grills that allow free movement of air above and below. I loaded up 3 trays with PdF molded in a silicone form (~14g each): Trays #1 & #2 in the dehydrator, and #3, as a control, open to the air but not in the dehydrator. For the 2 in the dehydrator, I’d run the machine for a couple of times a day to heat up / change the air but I didn’t leave it running all the time. Once the temperature rose above 40C, I didn’t think it would benefit the PdF. If I could have easily run the fan without the heater, then I think that would have been ideal. As it was, I think my dehydrator just ended up trapping a bit more moisture than it should have.

Trays #1 & #2 lost ~2.7% total weight; Tray #3 lost ~3.2% . Therefore, leaving them out to the open was the most effective (and the simplest).

ETA: The PdF were sugared just after removing them from the mold, and again at the end just before packaging for a light touch up. There was a very slight degradation of the sugar coating on the ones in the dehydrator.

Edited November 30, 2008 by John DePaula (log)

[Kerry Beal]

Sugared before or after drying?

[John DePaula]

Sugared before or after drying?

←

Good point. They were sugared just after demolding and again right before packaging.

[Truc]

Hi everyone I got the chance to make these pdf a while ago. The recipe was from peter greweling's book, they were great and im going to experiment with some other flavours next time. Enjoy.

http://truc-journeyofapatissier.blogspot.com/

[ncorrigbl]

Hi everyone I got the chance to make these pdf a while ago. The recipe was from peter greweling's book, they were great and im going to experiment with some other flavours next time. Enjoy.

http://truc-journeyofapatissier.blogspot.com/

←

Odd, I tried to like to that one and it said the blog wasn't there. Have I missed something??

I have everything I need to try these, even a refractometer, I am so excited to begin! I'll let you know how they come out. I got some inexpensive but pure fruit purees from Goya in my local grocery store. This will be a practice run while I wait for the local farms to get lovely fresh fruit!

[cmflick]

Hi everyone I got the chance to make these pdf a while ago. The recipe was from peter greweling's book, they were great and im going to experiment with some other flavours next time. Enjoy.

http://truc-journeyofapatissier.blogspot.com/

←

Odd, I tried to like to that one and it said the blog wasn't there. Have I missed something??

I have everything I need to try these, even a refractometer, I am so excited to begin! I'll let you know how they come out. I got some inexpensive but pure fruit purees from Goya in my local grocery store. This will be a practice run while I wait for the local farms to get lovely fresh fruit!

←

The Goya frozen fruit purees make excellent pdf. I've used them before. I just got some slow-set "yellow pectin" from L'Epicerie that I'm going to try for making mango pdf using a Goya puree. I've used apple pectin in the past and have had problems with the pdf starting to set as I'm getting it out of the pot. Supposedly, the "yellow pectin" sets a a lower temperature and will help avoid premature setting. I have a silicon pdf mold that I want to use, but using apple pectin I haven't been able to pour the pdf into the molds fast enough before it sets. Apple pectin is okay when I'm pouring a slab, because I can get it out of the pot faster. Wish me luck!

[John DePaula]

Hi everyone I got the chance to make these pdf a while ago. The recipe was from peter greweling's book, they were great and im going to experiment with some other flavours next time. Enjoy.

http://truc-journeyofapatissier.blogspot.com/

←

Odd, I tried to like to that one and it said the blog wasn't there. Have I missed something??

I have everything I need to try these, even a refractometer, I am so excited to begin! I'll let you know how they come out. I got some inexpensive but pure fruit purees from Goya in my local grocery store. This will be a practice run while I wait for the local farms to get lovely fresh fruit!

←

The Goya frozen fruit purees make excellent pdf. I've used them before. I just got some slow-set "yellow pectin" from L'Epicerie that I'm going to try for making mango pdf using a Goya puree. I've used apple pectin in the past and have had problems with the pdf starting to set as I'm getting it out of the pot. Supposedly, the "yellow pectin" sets a a lower temperature and will help avoid premature setting. I have a silicon pdf mold that I want to use, but using apple pectin I haven't been able to pour the pdf into the molds fast enough before it sets. Apple pectin is okay when I'm pouring a slab, because I can get it out of the pot faster. Wish me luck!

←

Good luck!

And please let us know how you like the yellow pectin, esp. if you note any textural or flavor differences from regular apple pectin.

[Kerry Beal]

Just looking through a flyer I received from Boiron before Christmas - it appears they have added some recipes in order to "preserve the typical flavour of fresh fruit". It appears that apple juice has been added to most recipes. They state that apple juice softens the fruit paste and recommends it instead of more pectin. Interestingly there are no cooking directions for these juice inclusive recipes.

It also states that the confectionary table now includes recipes for fruit paste, fruit fillings for caramels and jams. They've also added some flavours - such as green apple/pineapple and lemongrass, cranberry/morello cherry and cinnamon, tropical fruits with lime zest, raspberry/red pepper and lemon zest, coconut/condensed milk and lemongrass.

Looks like you need to subscribe to the Journal du Fruit to get this - older newsletters can be seen on the site www.lesvergersboiron.com, but not this latest one from autumn/winter 2008/2009 yet.

[Serj]

Kerry I have been making an apple pate de fruit at work recently with apple juice and the texture does come out softer than pate de fruit with just apple puree. It's not a boiron recipe, I don't think, so it could be a completely different ratio of pectin/sugar/fruit than the capfruit recipe I've used before, which may or may not explain it. My boss has a lot of French pate de fruit recipes lying around, and a lot of them call for juice, as do some of the ones from the FPS... There must be something to it, the French are pretty good at this gig.

[schneich]

some fruit flavours weaken because of the long cooking time. if you want to do flavours like passion, raspberry, orange, cassis or tangerine you wont have any probs going just with the fruit puree, but if you want to do flavors like cherry, strawberry, apricot, pear or every other "weaker" tasting fruit you need to strenghten the flavour a little bit. to get really great tasting pate de fruit i either use high quality icecream compounds from elenka or mec3 (simply deduct the desired amount from the fruit puree, and add the same amount of compound as late in the cooking process as possible) the other thing is that you could use a high quality flavoring after you pulled the pate from the fire. sosa has created what they call "the alphabet of flavors" you will find it in the catalog towards the end. its a box of 190 flavors of very high quality, you could also buy single falvors of course...

cheers

t.

Edited January 8, 2009 by schneich (log)

[tan319]

That's some serious stuff!!!

In the US you can go to Le Sanctuaire online, they carry a lot of the Sosa products.

[John DePaula]

That's some serious stuff!!!

In the US you can go to Le Sanctuaire online, they carry a lot of the Sosa products.

←

Sosa stuff looks great. Just wish that it was easier to identify which of their products are "all natural" and contain no artificial colors or preservatives. For many, that's important.

In spots, looks like the Mentos people must have done the translations...

[cmflick]

Hi everyone I got the chance to make these pdf a while ago. The recipe was from peter greweling's book, they were great and im going to experiment with some other flavours next time. Enjoy.

http://truc-journeyofapatissier.blogspot.com/

←

Odd, I tried to like to that one and it said the blog wasn't there. Have I missed something??

I have everything I need to try these, even a refractometer, I am so excited to begin! I'll let you know how they come out. I got some inexpensive but pure fruit purees from Goya in my local grocery store. This will be a practice run while I wait for the local farms to get lovely fresh fruit!

←

The Goya frozen fruit purees make excellent pdf. I've used them before. I just got some slow-set "yellow pectin" from L'Epicerie that I'm going to try for making mango pdf using a Goya puree. I've used apple pectin in the past and have had problems with the pdf starting to set as I'm getting it out of the pot. Supposedly, the "yellow pectin" sets a a lower temperature and will help avoid premature setting. I have a silicon pdf mold that I want to use, but using apple pectin I haven't been able to pour the pdf into the molds fast enough before it sets. Apple pectin is okay when I'm pouring a slab, because I can get it out of the pot faster. Wish me luck!

←

Good luck!

And please let us know how you like the yellow pectin, esp. if you note any textural or flavor differences from regular apple pectin.

←

I tried out the "yellow pectin" by making mango pdf using Goya fruit puree and a recipe from Frutta Prima (Pate de Fruit Chart). Usually, I use Boiron recipes, but alas I couldn't find one for mango pdf. The yellow pectin definitely set more slowly and made it easy to get the pdf from the pot into my silicon pdf mold. I haven't noticed any difference in flavor between using apple pectin and yellow pectin. The texture, however, seems better to me. I would describe it as softer and smoother than when I used apple pectin. Definitely an improvement.

Kerry: can you comment any further on the new Boiron recipes using apple juice? I don't get their newsletter and the recipes using apple juice aren't on their web site.

[John DePaula]

Hi everyone I got the chance to make these pdf a while ago. The recipe was from peter greweling's book, they were great and im going to experiment with some other flavours next time. Enjoy.

http://truc-journeyofapatissier.blogspot.com/

←

Odd, I tried to like to that one and it said the blog wasn't there. Have I missed something??

I have everything I need to try these, even a refractometer, I am so excited to begin! I'll let you know how they come out. I got some inexpensive but pure fruit purees from Goya in my local grocery store. This will be a practice run while I wait for the local farms to get lovely fresh fruit!

←

The Goya frozen fruit purees make excellent pdf. I've used them before. I just got some slow-set "yellow pectin" from L'Epicerie that I'm going to try for making mango pdf using a Goya puree. I've used apple pectin in the past and have had problems with the pdf starting to set as I'm getting it out of the pot. Supposedly, the "yellow pectin" sets a a lower temperature and will help avoid premature setting. I have a silicon pdf mold that I want to use, but using apple pectin I haven't been able to pour the pdf into the molds fast enough before it sets. Apple pectin is okay when I'm pouring a slab, because I can get it out of the pot faster. Wish me luck!

←

Good luck!

And please let us know how you like the yellow pectin, esp. if you note any textural or flavor differences from regular apple pectin.

←

I tried out the "yellow pectin" by making mango pdf using Goya fruit puree and a recipe from Frutta Prima (Pate de Fruit Chart). Usually, I use Boiron recipes, but alas I couldn't find one for mango pdf. The yellow pectin definitely set more slowly and made it easy to get the pdf from the pot into my silicon pdf mold. I haven't noticed any difference in flavor between using apple pectin and yellow pectin. The texture, however, seems better to me. I would describe it as softer and smoother than when I used apple pectin. Definitely an improvement.

Kerry: can you comment any further on the new Boiron recipes using apple juice? I don't get their newsletter and the recipes using apple juice aren't on their web site.

←

Thanks for reporting back to us!

[Kerry Beal]

I notice that there are none of the new recipes on the website - in spite of their suggestion that they are.

The recipes are huge - raspberry recipe uses 1 kg of fruit puree, 1 kg of individually quick frozen fruit, 1 litre of apple juice, 300g/75g sugar/pectin, 3000g sugar, 600 g glucose and 45 g acid solution.

For Kalamansi it's 1 kg fruit, 2 litres of apple juice, 300g/60g sugar/pectin, 2600g sugar, 500 g glucose and 25 g acid solution.

But as I said before - no instructions. And no suggestion of the form of the 'flavour enhancers' such as lemongrass.

Serj - can you give us general directions for the recipes you make with apple juice?

[John DePaula]

I notice that there are none of the new recipes on the website - in spite of their suggestion that they are. 

The recipes are huge - raspberry recipe uses 1 kg of fruit puree, 1 kg of individually quick frozen fruit, 1 litre of apple juice, 300g/75g sugar/pectin, 3000g sugar, 600 g glucose and 45 g acid solution. 

For Kalamansi it's 1 kg fruit, 2 litres of apple juice, 300g/60g sugar/pectin, 2600g sugar, 500 g glucose and 25 g acid solution.

But as I said before - no instructions.  And no suggestion of the form of the 'flavour enhancers' such as lemongrass. 

Serj - can you give us general directions for the recipes you make with apple juice?

←

I checked the French side of the site as well (often, you'll find the French/English sites not at all equivalent) but no luck.

[Kerry Beal]

I've sent them a question about it - we'll see how quickly they get back to me.

[sote23]

some fruit flavours weaken because of the long cooking time. if you want to do flavours like passion, raspberry, orange, cassis or tangerine you wont have any probs going just with the fruit puree, but if you want to do flavors like cherry, strawberry, apricot, pear or every other "weaker" tasting fruit you need to strenghten the flavour a little bit. to get really great tasting pate de fruit i either use high quality icecream compounds from elenka or mec3 (simply deduct the desired amount from the fruit puree, and add the same amount of compound as late in the cooking process as possible) the other thing is that you could use a high quality flavoring after you pulled the pate from the fire. sosa has created what they call "the alphabet of flavors" you will find it in the catalog towards the end. its a box of 190 flavors of very high quality, you could also buy single falvors of course...

cheers

t.

←

Do you have a website link for elenka? I'm not familiar with them.

Luis

[John DePaula]

some fruit flavours weaken because of the long cooking time. if you want to do flavours like passion, raspberry, orange, cassis or tangerine you wont have any probs going just with the fruit puree, but if you want to do flavors like cherry, strawberry, apricot, pear or every other "weaker" tasting fruit you need to strenghten the flavour a little bit. to get really great tasting pate de fruit i either use high quality icecream compounds from elenka or mec3 (simply deduct the desired amount from the fruit puree, and add the same amount of compound as late in the cooking process as possible) the other thing is that you could use a high quality flavoring after you pulled the pate from the fire. sosa has created what they call "the alphabet of flavors" you will find it in the catalog towards the end. its a box of 190 flavors of very high quality, you could also buy single falvors of course...

cheers

t.

←

Do you have a website link for elenka? I'm not familiar with them.

Luis

←

http://www.elenka.eu

[sote23]

some fruit flavours weaken because of the long cooking time. if you want to do flavours like passion, raspberry, orange, cassis or tangerine you wont have any probs going just with the fruit puree, but if you want to do flavors like cherry, strawberry, apricot, pear or every other "weaker" tasting fruit you need to strenghten the flavour a little bit. to get really great tasting pate de fruit i either use high quality icecream compounds from elenka or mec3 (simply deduct the desired amount from the fruit puree, and add the same amount of compound as late in the cooking process as possible) the other thing is that you could use a high quality flavoring after you pulled the pate from the fire. sosa has created what they call "the alphabet of flavors" you will find it in the catalog towards the end. its a box of 190 flavors of very high quality, you could also buy single falvors of course...

cheers

t.

←

Do you have a website link for elenka? I'm not familiar with them.

Luis

←

http://www.elenka.eu

←

thanks

[John DePaula]

Interesting that they add the tartaric acid and continue to cook...

I always thought that you pretty much had to add the acid and pour out immediately.

Edited January 9, 2009 by John DePaula (log)