Dried Plums at Home: Recipes

For a long time, plums were considered an excellent object for harvesting. In the villages, these fruits were made to dry, wet or cook a compote of them. But the most popular to this day is still dried plums. The process of preparing them is quite long, but the result is a product with excellent taste qualities.

Ways to prepare

Those who at least once tried sundried plums know that they can be not only a fragrant dessert or a fine snack.

This juicy fruit, processed in a special way, in some cases used as the original side dish for meat. Unusual addition favorably shades the taste of the main dish and makes it more pleasant. To prepare dried plums, it is necessary to conduct food processing at elevated temperature. For this you can use:

• Russian stove;
• Oven;
• Electric dryer.

For each of these options, there are certain modes and conditions that must be met to ensure that the product obtained meets the desired requirements. Basically, the technique is reduced to performing the following actions:

1. General processing and partial grinding of fruits. Plums can also be dried whole.
2. Initial temperature treatment.
3. Introduction of additional components.
4. Final processing.

Depending on the chosen option, the result is a product that has certain taste qualities.

Benefits and harm of spicy plums

As you know, the fruits of plum tree are excellent helpers for the human body. They are capable of:

• To cope with problems of the digestive tract;
• Prevent the appearance of blood clots;
• Regulate the level of acidity in the human stomach;
• Have a positive effect on liver function;
• Preserve sight;
• Detoxify;
• Normalize the metabolism.

In addition, plums are often used as a cosmetic remedy, since they are able to nourish skin cells, rejuvenating and making it more elastic. All these useful properties retain in themselves and dried plums. They can be consumed by everyone, except for those who have certain medical contraindications to this product. This category of people includes patients suffering from diabetes or obesity, which is better not to include these fruits in their daily diet because of their high caloric value. Nursing mothers should also beware of draining, so as not to cause colic or upset stomach in toddlers.

With your own hands

Fragrant spicy plums can turn even the most simple dish into a real culinary masterpiece. That is why it is desirable for each hostess to have such useful products at home in stock. But for this it is not necessary to go to the store. You can calmly make dried plums at home. And this will require quite a few products: 1 kilogram of fresh plums, 3 cloves of garlic, salt, 100 milliliters of olive oil, fragrant and black pepper, as well as dried herbs (rosemary, oregano and thyme).

Doing dried plums at home is not difficult. For this you need:

1. Select for work only ripe, fleshy, but fairly dense fruit. After that they need to be washed and well dried.
2. Each drain with a sharp knife is divided into two halves and extracted from them bones.
3. Slices slightly sprinkled with salt and a mixture of dried herbs, and then gently arrange them on a baking sheet.
4. Heat the oven to 120 degrees, and then send the prepared products there for 5 hours.
5. At this time, you can clean the garlic and prepare the necessary dishes.
6. After the treatment, the lobules of the sink should be slightly wrinkled and lose in volume. Now they need to be folded into a glass container, alternating with the remaining spices and pieces of garlic.
7. Next, the products need to be poured with oil, clogged and put in the refrigerator.

In this condition, the products can be stored for up to 3 months. At any time they can be obtained and used for their intended purpose.

According to the advice of Italian masters

In the Mediterranean countries, spicy vegetables and fruits are very popular. So, in the Italian cuisine there is a recipe with which you can make very delicious dried plums in the oven yourself. This will require the following set of ingredients: 1.2 kilograms of ripe plums, 80-90 milliliters of olive oil and 50 milliliters of vegetable oil, a pinch of sea salt, 5 cloves of garlic, 2 teaspoons of a mixture of Mediterranean dried herbs with basil and a tablespoon of liquid honey.

The process of preparation must be carried out in a certain sequence:

1. Remove the stones from the washed fruits, and cut the remaining pulp into 4 parts.
2. Lay them peel down on a baking sheet covered with foil or parchment.
3. In a separate bowl, aromatic herbs mixed with butter and honey. With the mixture obtained, pour the products.
4. After that, they need to be salted and sprinkled with herbs again.
5. Baking tray with prepared fruits put for 3 hours in the oven, preheated before 130 degrees.
6. In conclusion, dried quarters should be put in clean jars, along with finely chopped garlic and fresh herbs (rosemary, basil), and then pour it all with olive oil and close tightly with a lid.

Keep these blanks after cooling better in a cool place.

The simplest version

Those who are not used to piquant scents, you can offer to make sweet dried plums in the oven. It will be very simple, because for work it will take only two basic components: 2 kilograms of fresh plums and 400 grams of granulated sugar.

For work it is better to choose a sort of Hungarian. Its fruits are large enough and fleshy. The technology of the process in this case will be somewhat different:

1. First, as usual, the fruit should be washed, and then, cutting each of them in half, remove the stone.
2. After this, the workpieces must be put in an enameled container (pan), pour them with sugar, and then, placing the top on the press, put it in a cool place for several hours until juice appears on the surface.
3. The liquid must be separated by straining through a colander, and put the halves on a baking sheet, not forgetting to cover it with parchment.
4. Oven to warm up to 60 degrees, and then put products into it, leaving the door slightly ajar. The processing time will depend on the desired degree of drying.

Finished products should be simply put in sterile jars and, covering them with a lid, put in a cool place.

In natural conditions

To get a delicious dried plum, the recipe can be simplified as much as possible, eliminating any additional devices from it. So, for the heat treatment it is not necessary to use an oven. It can be replaced by natural sun rays. For such an option, the main ingredients will be required in the following ratio: 5 kilograms of plums (not overpacked), 2 buckets of water and 80 grams of soda food.

The work will be carried out in the following order:

1. First plums need to be sorted by removing the rotten fruits.
2. After that, they must be cut along and extracted bones.
3. Water boil with soda (10 liters 80 grams), and then, laying the slices in a colander, lower them alternately in boiling solution for 3 minutes.
4. Processed products immediately put in a bucket of cold water.
5. After this, the blanks must be washed, dried with a towel and, spread out on sheets of plywood, covered with gauze, put in the sun.
6. After a three-hour treatment, the fruit should be removed for 5 hours in the shade.
7. Alternation of heating and drying should be repeated several times until the products become sufficiently elastic and from them, when pressed, the liquid will not stop escaping.

It turns out a very delicate and fragrant dried plum. The recipe is good for the residents of the countryside and the owners of summer cottages.

Technology to help

It is very easy to make dried plums in an electric dryer. This unit partially replaces the oven. Therefore, for both devices, the same recipes sometimes come up. Using an electric drying chamber, many products are processed. And sometimes the options are practiced, when this requires a minimum preparation of the main ingredient. That's how electric prunes make prunes.

For work only fresh fruits, water and baking soda are needed. Waxing of products occurs as follows:

1. The first thing to do is to blanch the fruits. To do this, they must first be lowered for 30 seconds into a boiling solution of soda (15 grams of powder per liter of liquid), and then immediately rinsed in cold water. It should be ensured that cracks do not appear on the surface of the fruit. In this case, either reduce the time of the temperature treatment, or reduce the concentration of the solution.
2. Prepared plums spread on a pallet, baked with baking paper, and send them to the drying chamber for 3 hours at a temperature of 50 degrees.
3. Take out the food and allow them to cool completely and lie down for 4 hours.
4. Send the plums again to the dryer. At the same time, the temperature should be at least 75 degrees.

This alternation can be repeated for two days. The main thing is that the product to the touch remains elastic and when pressed from the pulp juice does not stand out.

Spicy sweets

There is one more original variant with which help it is possible to prepare without difficulty the sun dried plums sweet. In this case, you need very little time, and as additional ingredients you will only need salt, spices and sugar.

The method of preparation is somewhat similar to the previous versions:

1. Washed plums in the usual way divided into two halves and extract from them bones.
2. After that, they need to be sprinkled with the selected additional components. To make dried fruits as sweet as possible, all ingredients except sugar can be completely eliminated.
3. Put the products in the oven for a couple of hours at a temperature of 120 degrees and wait until the wedges a little dry. At the same time they must retain their plasticity.

The finished products will only be left in clean glass jars and poured with oil. Store the food in a cool place under a closed lid. For flavor, along with dried plums, you can put a little garlic. If only sugar was used, this should not be done.