Proper grape drying at home – at what temperature
Dried grapes are a nutritious and very useful treat that can be eaten fresh or added to various dishes. Drying grapes for raisins in home conditions allows you to preserve all the properties of berries and get a natural product. This procedure is carried out in different ways, depending on certain conditions, for example, berries are dried under sunlight, in an electric dryer or in the oven. Each method has its own peculiarities, which should be clarified in advance.
How to dry grapes for raisins at home
Properly cooked raisins retain up to 80% of the vitamins, as well as all the trace elements, making them a great nutritious food for children and adults alike. It’s important to remember how to dry grapes and use the most correct method, taking into account individual conditions. Only in this case, the dried fruit will be really nutritious and tasty. At home it is not difficult, but first you need to decide on the variety of grapes and other factors.
Can I dry grapes with pips?
Before drying grapes in any home conditions, it is necessary to prepare the initial raw material. For this purpose, both purchased berries and those collected on your own plot are purchased.
Basically, drying grapes, in which there are no seeds, as it is more convenient to eat them in their pristine form. You can choose large and small berries from dark or light varieties of grapes.
This is interesting! The taste of raisins is influenced by its variety and drying option. It can turn out grassy or nutty, sour-sweet.
Grapes with seeds can also be dried, such raisins will be no less pleasant to taste.
How to choose the right grapes for drying
Regardless of how exactly the grapes will be dried, the first thing you need to do is to choose the most appropriate fruit. The best option – perfectly ripe grapes, without damage, varieties Kishmish, Kodryanka, Muscat, Russball, Rizamat, Sultani and others.
Before the procedure, it is important to sort the fruits, they must be fully ripe, with a dense and thin skin and flesh. All rotten and spoiled berries must be removed, the large ones are divided into several parts.
Options for drying grapes
To make a quality product, it is necessary to prepare for drying grapes. If the berries are collected in your garden, then two weeks before collecting them over-dry, as excessive moisture contributes to the loss of sugar, and this negatively affects the overall quality of the fruit. Grapes to be dried are harvested only in dry weather, when the dew dries out.
If desired, the fruit can be further prepared and treated in a boiling alkaline solution. Such a procedure will help remove the waxy coating from the surface of the berries.
Important! Light pink and light-colored varieties do not lose color if you fume them with sulfur for an hour. After the finished berries are laid out on trays or trays in a row, where they dry for at least 2-3 days.
Sun-drying in the air is used for quilts and all varieties that wilt earlier. In this method, the berries should be dried at least 20-30 days, if the pre-blanching was carried out, clusters are inverted every 3-4 days.
Delicious dried grapes are obtained in electric dryers, and drying in this variant is considered accelerated. To get high raisins, it is necessary to distribute hot air evenly over the volume of the dryer and maintain a suitable temperature.
Natural drying in the sun and in the shade
You can use the sun to dry grapes naturally.
Before drying, each berry is checked for dirt and decay, and then spread out evenly in the most convenient manner. The fruit is spread out on paper, bars or tablets on the sunny side and turned over every three days.
Important! The berries from your vineyard inevitably over-fertilize two weeks before picking, so that they do not become too soft and fully retain their valuable properties.
No less popular is the Central Asian method of drying, in which berries are dried mainly in the shade. For this purpose, they arrange special rooms made of clay houses, made with gaps for ventilation, bake there, preheating the rooms with sulfur for a full hour. With this option, raisins fully retain their original color, as well as vitamins and trace elements.
Homemade in an electric dryer.
This is important for those who want to save time. It is important to remember exactly how to dry grapes of each variety in an electric appliance. The best option is a device for vegetables and fruits, which preserves all the useful properties of fruits.
Before the procedure, it is necessary to thoroughly wash all berries, remove spoiled and damaged fruits, cut off long branches. Then the raw material with baking soda is added to boiling water, where the grapes are dipped for a few seconds, and then washed under cold water.
Important! Despite the fact that canning dried grapes at home with a dryer, the finished result will pleasantly surprise. The dewdrops turn out very tasty and with a pleasant aroma.
Before drying grapes in a drier for berries and fruits, it should be placed on a towel to absorb excess liquid, then you can continue the drying process. Grapes are properly created on trays and change once an hour. After 7 hours, the device should be turned off and allowed to cool down.
Drying is carried out in several stages, the second should take at least 8 hours, and if the berries are large, the third stage is required. At the end of the process, the device is turned off and the finished raisins are taken out.
In the oven
Raisins in the oven turns out no less delicious than in an electric dryer – it is quite a soft and fragrant product with a natural sugar content. Before the process, it is necessary to select high-quality grapes with a thick bowl, they should be strong enough and fleshy. They are placed on a baking sheet, which is lowered into the oven to 55 degrees. The oven door should be opened more often and lie on the baking sheet.
To ensure that fresh raisins are as juicy, the oven must be turned off and on several times. Thus, the drying process lasts at least 2-3 days, like vegetables. The exact time depends on the variety of grapes and the size of the berries. On the last day the grapes are dried, and the temperature is set to 35 degrees.
Why is it better to dry grapes at home?
Drying fresh grapes for the winter makes sense in every way – the finished product can last as long as possible, fully preserving its properties. Cooking raisins at home has many advantages, the list of which includes:
- The ability to individualize the taste of the finished product by choosing a particular grape variety;
- confidence in the quality and purity of the product;
- When the grapes are harvested, the main part can be used to make raisins;
- Excellent taste and naturalness of homemade raisins compared to store raisins;
- The ability to control the softness of raisins during cooking.
Quality homemade raisins are clearly superior to store-bought raisins in their properties, flavor, and aroma. This is a good reason to take the time to prepare and choose the most appropriate method depending on conditions and needs. You need to know exactly how to dry homemade grapes in an electric dryer, which variety to choose and how to dry grapes at home in general. This information will help you prepare the perfect homemade raisins.
Homemade raisins and sultanas – healthy deliciousness with their own hands
When grapes are dried, their nutritional value increases: potassium salts increase (useful for blood circulation), acids soften (important for stomach ulcers and constipation). In addition, dried fruits are stored for up to a year, while “raw” no more than a month or two. Everyone can make their own high-quality raisins or sultanas.
Varieties of grapes suitable for making raisins at home
Raisins are made from grapes of seeded varieties, and raisins are made from seedless varieties. However, not all varieties of these groups are suitable for drying. Suitable (and best) are:
- For raisins:
- Barrow ring-tailed (mask),
- Sultani (pine),
- Kara Janjal,
- nimrang,
- Shutur Angoor,
- rizamat,
- Kara Kaltak,
- Muscat of Alexandria.
- asker,
- Bedona,
- Russian Corinka,
- kish-mish:
- White,
- black,
- pink,
- luida,
- khishrau.
What to do at once
The ripe berries removed from the bush must be dried the same day, otherwise they will largely lose their sweetness and astringent taste. Before the main process begins, all grapes damaged by diseases, pests and the sun should be removed, and the rest should be sorted by bunch size (outdoor, indoor processing) or fruit size (electromechanical dehydration). The latter makes it possible to prepare “smooth” raisins (sultanas) and avoid their overstacking and overwatering.
How to dry grapes in the oven or electric dryer (step-by-step guide)
- Bring water to a boil, dissolve caustic (half a teaspoon per 1 liter) in it and boil for 5 minutes, removing the foam with a slotted skimmer. Treatment with boiling caustic soda tears the skin of fruits and from its surface is separated pruin (waxy coating), which accelerates further drying.
- Portions of berries are dipped into “alkaline” boiling water with a kitchen colander and boiled for 3-6 seconds (2 liters of diluted caustic soda is enough for 10 kg of grapes). Experiments of the Samarkand branch of UzNIISViV in the 20th century showed that it is not necessary to wash grapes after such blanching. All alkalis left on it are neutralized by berry acid.
- Spread the fruit in a single layer on a baking sheet in the oven or on the trays of an electric dryer.
Dry about a day and a half at +55 ° C, but every 8 hours (if desired):
- Turn off and turn on the oven again after it has cooled completely.
- Reverse the order of the dryer’s trays.
- The gentle method avoids blanching in a boiling soda solution. This preserves the vitamins B6 and C contained in the grapes, but increases the drying time to 4-5 days.
Cooking raisins outside with your own hands (sultanas)
To dry grapes in the sun, they should be placed in clusters (in one layer, at intervals) in a bright place all day long and covered with a tarp (polyethylene). Bunches of berries should be turned every week. To protect the fruit from rain, strong wind, birds and rodents, it is better to conduct the procedure in a glazed greenhouse (polycarbonate or “foil” will also do) with constant ventilation.
Grapes dried in the sun, remains sweet, but in the oven it becomes a little more tart.
Alexander Duma
“The Big Cooking Dictionary” https://eda.wikireading.ru/134468.
In sun air-drying, berries can also be blanched beforehand (“rinded” in Tajik). This shortens the processing time to 4-10 days (transshipping every 48 hours). Without scalding with an alkaline solution (“aftobi”), the fruits are dried only on the 20th-30th day. Day off, even if every day is sunny. In addition, the mass loss when drying is 10% more (in the oven or electric dryer – similarly).
Ideal varieties for Objush are Nimrang, Sultani (Jaws), Rizamat, Katta Kurgan (Mask). White and black sultanas are perfectly prepared with Aftobi.
Raisins: how to dry grapes without removing them from the bush
The easiest way to dry grapes is to leave them on the bush and separate the vines so that the bunches of berries do not touch. Unfortunately, only some early varieties are suitable for this method. They ripen and are ready for drying in late summer, having accumulated the necessary 19-24% of sugars.
Table: Varieties of grapes for bush drying
variety Time to thin the vines Drying time for berries (in weeks) Hard mid-August 5 Thompson Sidliss 4–5 Dovin Summer Muscat 4 Selma Pete cinnamon black 3–4 Muscat diamond. 3 Judging by reliable sources on the Internet, shadow drying of grapes is not widespread. There are descriptions of special drying houses made of clay – soyagihons, in which the inhabitants of the Kashkadarya region (Uzbekistan) prepare white sultanas by the method of soyagihon. Details about this ingenious technology can be found here. By special order grapes can be dried in a warm (at least +40 ° C), ventilated room, with the brushes hanging freely under the ceiling on horizontal supports (rope, wire). In this case, processing time will be about a week (without blanching – 20-25 days), but the taste of the product somewhat deteriorate.
Grapes dried by one of the described methods, you can safely store in a dark, cool (up to +20 ° C) and dry place.
- Author: Maxim Danileiko
Hello! My name is Maxim, I am 31 years old. By education I am a journalist (SibFU, Krasnoyarsk), by nature – a creative, hardworking and motivated person.
