Easy Homemade Fruit Leather Recipe
Making fruit leather is a great way to preserve your favorite summer fruits and enjoy them all year long. Fruit leather can be made as an organic, raw, vegan and no sugar added food. Use this homemade fruit leather recipe to try your hand at a delicious, healthy and energy-boosting snack or treat! Cut it into pretty shapes for dessert place, share jars of it as gifts or roll it up as a natural alternative to fruit roll ups or other candies for you kids’ lunch box.
This fruit leather recipe is made with blueberries, but you can use nearly any type of fruit. If you’re using fruits with a skin (like apples, pears, peaches, etc.), it’s a good idea to peel them before starting your fruit leather recipe in order to get a nice and even texture. Berries work well in fruit leather, and you can even combine fruits (like raspberries and peaches or apples and pumpkins) and add spices (like cinnamon or ginger) for extra flavor.
This fruit leather recipe makes about 5 rounds/sheets (12-inches in diameter). It’s easiest to use a stacked dehydrator (American Harvest makes nice ones) equipped with rounded edge plastic sheets, but you can make cooked fruit leather in your oven on wax or parchment paper lined cookie sheets. (Most ovens don’t go below 150 degrees F in heat, and raw foods cannot be heated above 115 degrees F.)
Homemade Fruit Leather Recipe
Ingredients
8 cups fresh, organic fruit of choice (frozen also works)
juice of 1 one organic lime or lemon
1 cup organic sweetener (completely optional – not necessary at all if you don’t want your leather to be very sweet)
Method
Depending on the type of fruit you’re using, make sure it is chopped small enough that it is easily blendable (not necessary for berries).
Place your fruit and optional sweetener in a blender or food processor and blend until completely smooth. You may have to do this a couple of times depending on the size of your blender.
Place the fruit puree in a pot or bowl.
Prepare your dehydrator trays or cookie sheets and begin ladling thin layers of fruit puree onto them.
Spread the fruit puree evenly on the tray to a ¼ inch thickness using a spatula or flat spoon. Repeat this process until you have used up all the fruit puree in your fruit leather recipe. If you have a little left over, use it on oatmeal or for baking.
If you’re using a dehydrator, stack your strays on the machine and turn the heat dial to 115 degrees F and turn it on. If you’re using your oven, preheat to it’s lowest temperature and place in as many cookie sheets as you can fit. It will take 6-10 hours for the fruit leather recipe to set – check the center of the tray or cookie sheet to make sure the leather is not too tacky.
Once dry, peel the leather off the trays and cut or roll it up for storage. Place in a large glass jar and store out of the direct sunlight.
Related on Organic Authority:
Fight Food Waste With A… Dehydrator?
3 Homemade Organic Jerky Recipes
9 Sweet Ways to Eat n’ Enjoy Spring Apricots
Images: Myrtle Glen Farm
