Content
- 1 What is chokeberry
- 2 Is it possible to dry chokeberry?
- 3 Drying chokeberry at home
- 4 How to dry chokeberries in an electric dryer
- 5 How to dry chokeberries in the oven
- 6 How to dry chokeberry in an air fryer
- 7 How to dry chokeberries in clusters
- 8 How to dry chokeberry in the shade
- 9 Use of dried chokeberry
- 10 Rules for storing dried chokeberries
- 11 Conclusion
Drying chokeberry at home is no more difficult than any other fruit. But in order to sort and prepare the berries for drying, you need to know the rules for harvesting chokeberries and have time and patience. The chokeberry fruits are very small; they will take a long time to collect if you pick them immediately without the stalks. But in this case, the chokeberry will wrinkle and release juice even before drying, which should not be allowed. Therefore, when preparing dried fruits, the chokeberry is picked along with the stalks.
Raw materials already collected for drying and storage must be cleaned of dry branches, stalks and leaves. Given the size of the chokeberry fruit, this is not an activity for the faint of heart.
What is chokeberry
The real name of chokeberry is Aronia chokeberry.The homeland of this plant is North America, and chokeberry has nothing to do with real rowan. Therefore, contrary to some recommendations, chokeberries are harvested not after frost, but when the berries are ripe. Average ripening time is September or mid-October.
Is it possible to dry chokeberry?
You can dry anything you want if you want. It is only important to choose the right drying temperature. If the temperature is too high, the raw material will burn, and if the temperature is too low, it may turn sour or rot. Drying chokeberry is no more difficult than any other berry of the same size.
Chokeberry can be dried naturally or using household appliances. The natural method is more suitable for owners of private houses or summer cottages, where there is space to spread out/hang the chokeberry for several days. In apartments it is better to use household appliances to speed up the process.
How to prepare berries for drying
In autumn, fruits are cut from plants with scissors or a sharp knife directly in clusters, without separating the stalks. It is better to store the harvest in a hard container so as not to crush the ripe fruits. At home, the chokeberry is disassembled, the fruit stems are removed and spoiled berries are removed.
Do I need to wash chokeberry before drying?
In the former USSR, people are accustomed to washing fruits before eating. But whether it is necessary to wash chokeberry before drying it, everyone will choose according to their own beliefs. If the plant was not sprayed for pests shortly before harvest, and the garden is located no closer than 200 m from a busy road, then there is no difference between washed and unwashed fruits. The only theoretical benefit: pest larvae can crawl out of the berries. But not all.
When drying in household appliances, the maximum temperature will be 50-60 °C.Any pest larvae will die. When drying chokeberries naturally, the pests will have time to lay eggs in the drying berries again.
If the choice was made in favor of washing the chokeberry, then the berries are washed in running water. After the procedure, the chokeberry is placed on a towel to dry. Dried fruits can be prepared for drying.
Drying chokeberry at home
If in industry there are special installations that allow you to set the drying time and temperature, then at home you will have to make do with improvised means:
- electric dryer;
- oven;
- air fryer;
- a harsh thread;
- thin twine.
Using household electrical appliances, you can quickly dry chokeberry. This will only take a few hours, not counting drying after washing. But if you make a mistake with the temperature, the result will be either coals, or the chokeberry will burn on top and remain raw inside.
A change in color to brown or reddish indicates a violation of the regime when drying the chokeberry. In this case, some of the vitamins are lost.
How to dry chokeberries in an electric dryer
An electric fruit dryer is a household appliance that has no other functions. Products to be dried in it are located on several tiers. You will have to dry the chokeberry in an electric dryer in a layer as thick as one berry, since the fruits must dry evenly, and it is impossible to stir them in an electric dryer.
How long to dry chokeberry in an electric dryer
Drying chokeberries in an electric dryer is carried out at a temperature of 50 ° C for 3 hours. Then the chokeberry is brought to readiness at 45 °C.
How to dry chokeberries in the oven
Drying chokeberries in the oven is somewhat more difficult than in an electric dryer. The oven is designed for other operations.
In the oven, the chokeberry is also laid out in a thin layer, after which it is dried for half an hour at a temperature of 35-40 °C. Therefore, the temperature is raised to 60°C and the product is cooked until cooked.
To properly dry chokeberries in the oven, you need to leave the cabinet door ajar. There is no normal air circulation in the oven. This makes it difficult to regulate the temperature inside the cabinet. If you keep the door closed, the berries will burn.
Failure to comply with the temperature conditions leads to deterioration in the quality of the finished product. After drying, the chokeberry is allowed to cool to room temperature and only then is it put away for storage.
How to dry chokeberry in an air fryer
The principle of drying chokeberries in a convection oven is the same as in an oven. The temperature conditions are the same. The advantage of the air fryer is that you do not need to stir up the chokeberry fruits to dry evenly. Since heat treatment occurs due to hot air circulating in a confined space, the fruits dry evenly.
The downside is that you will have to specially select mesh trays for chokeberries. Otherwise, using the air fryer will become economically unprofitable. The small mesh tray included will allow you to dry only a small batch of chokeberry. In this case, more than ¾ of the working space of the air fryer will remain empty.
How to dry in an air fryer
For drying, select ripe berries with thick, intact skins and place them on a mesh tray.Initially, the temperature is set to 60 °C and the chokeberry is dried for 30-60 minutes. The time depends on the number and size of chokeberry fruits. After drying, the berries are checked. If complete drying has not occurred, the chokeberry is again sent to the air fryer.
A skewer or other heat-resistant thin object can act as a “spacer”, which will not allow the lid to fit tightly onto the flask.
This is where the artificial accelerated methods that can be applied in the household end. Drying fruits naturally has been practiced for several hundred years and has proven its worth.
How to dry chokeberries in clusters
Chokeberry received the name “chokeberry” due to the fact that the berries grow in clusters similar to rowan berries. This property is used if you need to dry the chokeberry in clusters.
Preparation begins at harvest time. The bunches are carefully cut whole with scissors. The cut berries are tied into bunches of several clusters and hung in the shade under a canopy so that the breeze blows across the bunches.
The second option is to stretch a thin string under a canopy and hang the bunches on top of it. In this case, there is no need to secure them, but there is a risk that the stalks, which hold the entire bunch, will fall off after drying. Yes, and achieving balance in this case is difficult.
The chokeberry is left under a canopy until it dries. After this, the chokeberry is separated from the stalks and placed in storage.
How to dry chokeberry in the shade
The easiest way is to scatter the chokeberry in a thin layer on a clean cloth under a canopy and turn it over periodically.After a few days, the chokeberry will dry enough so that the crop can be stored.
The second method is more difficult. The chokeberry is strung on a thick thread and hung in the shade.
Otherwise, there will be insufficiently dry places at the contact points. During storage, the chokeberry will begin to mold. Threading a chokeberry on a thread is not difficult. There are several small grains inside the fruit; the needle passes freely through the pulp.
Why you can’t dry berries in the sun
Strictly speaking, you can dry chokeberries in the sun. And such drying will be faster and more efficient than in the shade. But many vitamins degrade under sunlight. Therefore, chokeberry is dried in the sun if the presence of vitamins in the product does not matter. This drying can be carried out if you plan to make compote from the chokeberry. Vitamins that are degraded by heat treatment are in most cases the same as those that are destroyed by sunlight.
Use of dried chokeberry
In winter, dried chokeberries are used as a vitamin supplement. They are also used for diabetes and sclerosis.
Chokeberry has the property of thickening the blood, so it is contraindicated for hypertensive patients. Do not use it if you have a stomach ulcer, constipation or increased blood clotting.
Rules for storing dried chokeberries
Dried chokeberries harvested “naturally” can be stored for up to 8 months. Chokeberry prepared in home appliances can last for a year. This difference is due to the fact that during artificial drying, moisture evaporates better.
Store dried chokeberry fruits in canvas bags.They cannot be stored in airtight containers, since airtightness does not mean sterility. If there is a temperature difference in the room where dried fruits are stored, condensation will appear inside the sealed container. This will create excellent conditions for mold growth.
At the same time, when stored in fabric bags, chokeberries may harbor bugs. But with the bugs you will have to wage a full-fledged war within the confines of one apartment. They feed not only on dried berries.
Conclusion
Each owner chooses how to dry chokeberries himself, depending on the availability of household kitchen appliances or sufficient space in the house. Many people prefer not to dry the chokeberry at all, making jam or making liqueurs from it. The easiest way to preserve chokeberry is freezing.
