Honey and Plum Fruit Leather

Introduction

Readers who joined Apiary Forecast fairly recently may be surprised to find such a quick expansion of services, tools and site usefulness. John Richardson, founder, writes this week to acknowledge the support and feedback from everyone who helped him to develop Apiary Forecast, https://apiaryforecast.com/
“Thank you again, Ann, and thank you too to everyone who tried Apiary Forecast in those early days and took the time to send feedback.

A lot has changed since this article was published. Apiary Forecast has grown well beyond the original weather outlooks, with Hives Today, Colony Management, Apiary Visit, Stores Tracking and much more detailed support for individual saved apiaries now part of the service.

Quite a few of those changes came directly from people using it in the real world and telling me what was useful, what was awkward, and what didn’t quite make sense at the hive. That feedback has helped shape the product far more than I could have done on my own.

So a genuine thank you to the early adopters, and especially to those who challenged things, reported problems and compared the forecasts with what they were actually seeing in their colonies.

Apiary Forecast is still developing, and it’s a much more useful service now than it was since this original article.

Thank you all.

John”

Autumn Bounty

The season of abundance is upon us again. Honey might not be found in vast quantities in my apiary this year, but plums certainly are. The branches of the little Victoria plum tree are groaning under the weight of hundreds and hundreds of plums. Some branches are even snapping spontaneously under the pressure. On another rain-washed morning the tree still looks full despite several harvests already.

Neighbours, friends and family are all plummed out and my little dehydrator is working round the clock making fruit leather and drying plum segments for storing over winter—ideal for breakfasts of rolled oats and dried plums soaked overnight in milk. Yesterday on one of my long walks with Leo, a neighbour in the next hamlet offered me plums. I was on the verge of a polite refusal but noted desperation in her voice at the thought of wasted fruit (she can no longer eat them) so I accepted and was really pleased I had. Hers were much bigger and juicier than ours and the stones came out more easily. In no time I had another batch of leather in the dehydrator.

Little Leo loves fruit leathers, and so do I. The time has come to stop buying them and make my own. It’s amazing just how tasty they are if you bake the fruit in the oven first for a short while on a low setting. There is a lot a of juice left behind on the tray so I thicken it with a bit of icing sugar and pour over puddings, ice cream and yogurt.

I take the stones out first before the plums go in the oven, and prepping is a good time to catch up on Audiobooks. I’m a bit behind on my listening and have four books waiting to download,so by the time the plum tree is bare I should have finished Eva Zu Beck’s amazing adventures to some of the world’s most risky places for a woman to travel alone.

I have silicone mats for each of the trays that fit in the dehydrator, but for the fruit leather I line them with greaseproof paper so that the juice doesn’t drip onto the bottom of the machine, and the leather peels off the paper easily when dry enough.
I’m still a novice leather maker but have found it best to spread the fruit purée so that the centre is about 1/8 inches thick and the outside is about ¼ inch thick because the edges dry out more quickly. My first batch was a bit thin and too chewy for a small boy, but his daddy enjoyed it.

To reach the purée stage I scoop up the baked fruit in a slotted spoon and put it in a food processor with a couple of dollops of honey ( at least one tablespoon) and about a tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice for each 600ml purée.

I set the dehydrator temperature to 60°C for 15 hours but it is worth checking on progress before the time is up. You don’t want the centre to be soft and moist. I cut up the leathers into strips and store them in the fridge to retain their piquant flavour (eaten at room temperature) but you can store them for months in a glass jar.

You can make fruit and vegetable leathers in an oven too and if you live in a hot country you can dry leathers outside in the sun. There are lots of recipes on the internet. I hope this has inspired you to use up a glut of garden produce in different ways that don’t need a freezer or lots of sugar. If you are like me and have gone off sweet jams this is a great way to enjoy a really healthy snack. Great for long walks when you need a bit of energy, or in the evenings if you are trying to give up or ease back on chocolate.