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Dessert

To Dry Plums and Small Fruits

A method for drying plums and small fruits by layering with sugar, boiling, draining, and sun‑drying.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
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To Dry Plums and Small Fruits

Ingredients

Directions

Macerate and boil

  1. Pit the fruit and layer it in jars with sugar, using ½ pound of sugar for every pound of fruit.

  2. Let the jars stand for 24 hours.

  3. Boil the fruit for 10 minutes, skimming off any scum that rises.

Dry

  1. Remove the fruit from the syrup, drain it, and spread it thinly on dishes or sieves to dry in the sun.

  2. Turn the fruit every few hours until fully dry.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

What each ingredient does

Fruit
Provides the main body and flavor, concentrating as its water evaporates during drying.
Sugar
Draws water out of the fruit and helps preserve it, while adding sweetness.

The step that matters

Drying the fruit until fully dry. Sugar preserves the fruit only when its water content is low enough. Pieces left moist after drying can spoil or ferment, so turning them regularly and drying them completely matters.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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