How dates are dried at work and at home

Dried and dried fruits are more useful than raw. If you dry dates, store them for the winter, it will be a treasure trove of vitamins B5, E, H.

In the question of how to dry dates, you need to follow the recommendations of cooks.

Harvesting and industrial drying

Each date palm yields between 100 and 250 kilograms per year. Once harvested, the fruit is scattered on the ground where it dries naturally under the scorching sun. To keep them longer, bury them in hot sand before putting them in a container and leave them to dry for a few days.

After the drying process, the dates are washed. The pips are removed by hand from each fruit. Dates are sorted, processed and packaged.

How to dry sweet products in a non-natural way is not familiar to everyone. An oven is used for this purpose. Dried fruits are treated with a composition of sulfur, this will repel insects. To make dates sweeter, it is necessary to preserve them using glucose syrup. Dried fruits prepared with this method have an unnatural sheen. Natural dates that have no additives have a matte skin and are soft to the touch.

Naturally dried fruit has a sticky surface on which germs and bacteria can easily remain. Therefore, the dried fruit should not be left in an uncovered container for a long time or left out in the open air. Before consuming dates, they should be washed in boiled water. Dried fruits treated with chemicals must be soaked in hot water, changing it more than once, until the oily streaks on the surface of the liquid disappear completely.

Dates have few calories. Dried fruits are the most useful, they are antioxidants and antiradicals. They are easier and faster to dry for storage. It is better to consume dried fruit cut in half, get rid of the pit and see if there are any date moth infestations and eggs laid by it.

Choice of dates

Fresh palm fruit can be enjoyed in Israel, Algeria, Egypt, etc. In our country they are sold frozen, dried and dried.

Fresh dates have thick and glossy rinds with yellow, orange or red hues. It tastes juicy and sweet. The flesh of the fruit plucked from the palm tree is crisp like a persimmon. The pit is difficult to remove. The unripe fruit has a gray color with a greenish tint, a waxy coating, and an astringent taste.

Dried dates have a different color, uniform and deep brown. The fruit has a neat, rounded shape. Cracks and wrinkles on the rind are not present. The fruit is dry but slightly sticky to the touch. The quality product does not form into clumps. The softness of the pulp medium. Juicy low degree. The bones of dried dates are easy to remove.

If dates are dried without the use of chemicals, the skin of the dried fruit will be intact, dry and slightly translucent.

Home drying

At home, you can dry the fruit for a long time by putting it in a shady place, it will be soft. If dried in the sun for a long time, dates will become harder. Producers have different ways to process the fruit quickly. If the harvesting takes place before it is due, it is sufficient to bathe dates in a solution of non-food caustic soda in boiling water. This will make the thick skin crack, and dates will be dried sooner. But the juiciness of the fruit will decrease, through the cracks the fruit can become infected with bacteria.

Not every production facility uses the natural method of drying. For the mechanical method a furnace will do. After drying, the product is fumigated with sulfur dioxide. With the destruction of bacteria will not be harmful insects and the product can be stored for a long time.

The difference between dates that have been dried naturally and with an oven is clearly visible in the skin. If it cracks all over the fruit or peels off, it is an indication of working with a drying chamber or a high oven temperature. A minimal and almost invisible number of cracks on the skin may appear if the fruit is dried under the scorching rays of the sun. To preserve their marketable appearance, dried fruits are treated with petroleum products, liquid smoke, as well as coating the fruit in glycerin, palm fat. The chemically treated product can be distinguished by the intense shine of the skin.

Photo: taken from the internet