and so it begins, again

[ritaxis]

We don't have hundreds and hundreds of them, but the apricots are nearly ripe. This year I believe I'll dry them all.

Maybe this weekend?

Comments

[katiekin.livejournal.com]

I haven't had a ripe, juicy apricot right off the tree since I left Santa Cruz. Haven't found any I've bought to be in even remotely the same ball park of flavor, taste, texture.

The closest I've gotten is canned from Dole -- I just finished up a jar last night -- my favorite desert.

Dried sounds good too. Do you sulfur them or not? I'm not sure how one does that anyway?

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

I didn't dry apricots last year but I did dry plums and peaches. I didn't sulfur them. I believe if I was to sulfur them I would have to find the sulfite stuff -- I think maybe the company that sells the dehydrator also sells sulfite -- and I think it's a sprinkle or a soak.

What I did that worked out in a really satisfactory way was to slice them very thin and sprinkle them with this stuff fromthe grocery store called "fruit fresh" which is ascorbic acid and citric acid with a neutral carrier and trace amounts of sugar. It took a really short time to dry them and they came out paper-thin wafers of pure goodness. I didn't try to imitate the moist dried fruit you get in the store, which I think would have failed. I think I would have gotten either hard brown lumps or things that would rot.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

Surely you'll eat some!

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

A few, but the thing about all this fruit is that it comes on so fast it blindsides me and I don't get much fresh eating in.