Fruits For Baking has over 50 recipes and tips to help you cook up some of the tastiest fruit treats from exotic fruits. Baking is one of those slightly mystical areas in the kitchen that requires a certain amount of skill, timing, and a touch of magic. There are no tricks to follow here. Just read through the step-by-step instructions, use your own favorite flour blends, and get ready for some good old-fashioned baking fun! The list of fruits below are only a few examples of fruits used in baking.
What type of fruit is most requested by bakeries and hospitality premises?
Professionals in the HORECA industry, as well as those working in bakeries, ice cream parlors, and chocolatiers, all choose totally guaranteed, premium items to work with, with candied fruit being one of the most popular ingredients for their creations. They can be used as an ingredient in a vast array of cuisines, sauces, and new products, while being most closely linked with baked goods.
Professionals in this industry look for a reputable candied fruit company to have a broad catalogue and to offer the fruit in a variety of ways that meet their needs. In other words, a company that simplifies their life by providing a variety of advantages at work, both on a practical and creative level.
The most popular types of fruit used in factory-made baked goods and HORECA
Fruit, both fresh and candied, has long been a nearly necessary component of cakes and pastries. Below is a list of the fruit that expert bakers use the most frequently:
- Apple: Apples work well with pastry cream and dried fruits such as walnuts, almonds or pistachios in baked goods. Apple tart or apple sponge cake are some of the most popular cakes in the whole world due to their perfect mix of acidity and sweetness. There are many varieties of apples that mean professional bakers can always find one with the flavour and texture which they desire.
- Kiwi: This fruit is in season between October and March, the same as apples, and also work incredibly well with pastry cream. Their bright green colour and distinct flavour are their main assets, either chopped into small pieces to decorate the top of a cake or as a main ingredient. They can be served with bananas, apples, pineapples and oranges.
- Citric fruits: Oranges, lemons, tangerines, grapefruits and limes are all used in baking to counterbalance sweetness and provide a nice acidic tang to the final product. They are used in making tarts, jellies, ice creams, confectionary and many varieties of desserts. Both candied and fresh citric fruits are used in this way.
- Banana: this superb tropical fruit is often served with many kinds of chocolate, as well as alongside strawberries or raspberries. They are used in tarts, cakes, muffins, caramel desserts and ice creams. Banana is often served as a side dish with rice and meat.
- Peaches and apricots: both fruits are used by professional bakers in order to make jams and fruit pastes, cakes, tarts, flans, confectionary or crumbles. They can be served with apples, bananas, cherries and strawberries. They add an innovative flavour to cakes, ice creams and milkshakes.
- Fruits of the forest: blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, cherries, and blackberries are regularly used in factory-baked goods, in desserts, cakes, jams, sauces, salads or as a side dish for meat stews.
Desserts and dishes made with fruits
Professional chefs employ fruit in dishes other than cakes and desserts, as we indicated earlier. These are a few of their mouthwatering recommendations:
- Creme caramel with fruit and soft cheese: this delicious dessert is made using mascarpone cheese (although similar types of cheese can be used) and combining it with some or all of the following fruit options: kiwi, peach, cherry, strawberry and pineapple. It all depends on the creative imagination of the master baker and their desire to innovate.
- Crepes with fruit: crepes are always delicious in whatever shape or form, especially when served with fruit that makes them original and fresh. The most commonly served fruit with crepes are small chunks of strawberry, kiwi or pineapple.
- Creamy yogurt with fruit: this simple dessert is actually very delicious when the best ingredients are used and there is a good combination of fruits. This dessert is served at many hotel buffets and good restaurants.
- Fruit skewer: This is another dessert which can be open to imaginative interpretations, some of which are true works of art. Fruit can be served in numerous combinations, although it is best to limit the creation to a maximum of three fruits. Banana, tangerine and kiwi makes a good combination, as does kiwi, pineapple and orange.
- Fruit served on a biscuit base with crème pâtissière: This dessert works best with hard fruit such as kiwi, banana or pineapple. These fruits, combined with crumbled biscuit and pastry cream, is irresistible to anyone with a sweet tooth.
- Yogurt flan with red berries: this can be made with plain yogurt and gelatine. When served with cranberries, raspberries or blackberries, the end result is spectacular to the eye and taste buds.
- Fruit smoothies: this is an ideal way to cool down when the temperature is high. All of the typical summer fruits – melon, watermelon, cherries, mango and papaya – make perfect ingredients for a delicious shake.
It is undeniable that fresh and candied fruit play a significant role in many desserts, particularly those that are manufactured or served in hospitality settings. For our professional clients, Lazaya offers a wide variety of formats and ensures the finest quality goods. To learn more about our entire selection, get in touch with us right away.
The 6 Best Practices for Baking With Fruit
It must be time to start our summer baking, with vibrant rhubarb, pint-sized baskets of luscious strawberries, and peaches that are so ripe you can smell them from a mile away.
One of our favorite times of the year is the farmer’s market season. Vendors’ stalls convert into a playground for produce enthusiasts, packed with a profusion of fresh fruits and vegetables, almost immediately. Use these advice from Canadian food blogger Marcella DiLonardo, author of Bake The Seasons, to make the best fruity, summertime desserts, whether you’re making our mixed berry biscuit cobbler, plum tart, apple crisp, pluot crumble, or Grandma’s prize-winning pie. Let’s begin!
Shop for what’s in season.
The most crucial piece of advice for baking with fruit is to use seasonal ingredients. The advantages of baking with regional ingredients are numerous: Locally harvested fruit gives a recipe the best flavor and is more cost-effective. It also lessens our carbon footprint. In contrast to imported product, fruit that is harvested at its height of freshness adds a natural sweetness to your finished dish. Berries picking is also a lot of fun.
Choose fresh over frozen.
Fresh food always has more flavor than frozen food. When using frozen fruit in recipes, it frequently lacks flavor and swells with water, producing a liquid-y pie filling or mushy cake. If frozen fruit is your only option, defrost it out entirely and drain it before putting it in the mixing bowl.
Keep ’em clean.
Wash and dry your fresh vegetables completely to avoid having dirt and pesticides show up in your dish. Fruit already contains a lot of natural fluids, so adding more would make the filling sloppy.
Uniformity is key.
It’s vital to cut or dice your fruit into uniformly sized pieces before cooking, much like when cooking with vegetables. By doing this, you can guarantee that the fruit in your pie, galette, or crisp bakes through evenly. Well-sliced or diced fruity ingredients are also more enjoyable to bite into.
Dust fruit in flour first.
When baking with fresh fruit—like for loaf cakes, coffee cakes, or muffins—dust the fruit lightly in all-purpose flour before adding it to the batter. This keeps fruit from sinking and collecting at the bottom during baking. This tip applies to nuts and chocolate chips, too.
Baking with fruit? Here’s how to get it right every time
You’ve probably thought, “Yep, I could make that,” after seeing a stunning fruit pie, crumble, pudding, or cake recipe, only to end up with a disappointingly watery product (also known as the infamous #bakingfail). It’s not just you. A variety of factors come into play when baking with fruit, and you run the risk of having puddings with too much liquid, cakes with fruit that sinks to the bottom, or fruits that are deformed.
The following issues are all-too-common, but with these simple advice, they can be avoided.
Why is my fruit pie or crumble too wet?
Although your usual shopping instincts would be to pick the juiciest and ripest fruit on the grocer’s shelves, consider opting for fruit that’s just a little bit underripe, therefore less likely to release a lot of juice. If you’re baking with frozen fruit in a recipe that calls for fresh fruit, try defrosting and draining off any excess liquid before baking. Adding too much sugar can also lead to excess liquid, so it’s best to follow the amount recommended in the recipe.
How can I stop fruit sinking in muffins and cake?
Avoid a soggy bottom and fruitless top by tossing the fruit in a little flour to coat before adding to the batter. As the fruit cooks and releases liquid, the flour will absorb the moisture and the fruit won’t slide to the bottom.
Why is my baked fruit turning to mush?
It’s best to bake fruits that are on the firmer side, and it can be a wonderful way to use fruits that are underripe or not very sweet. Also, baking times can vary drastically depending on the state of the fruit you’re baking. Ripe fruits may soften much faster than the recommended cooking time, and vice versa.
Different varieties of fruit will behave differently, too. For example, Granny Smith apples will hold firm when baked, whereas varieties like Red Delicious go soft.
Depending on the kinds of fruit you’re baking, you might like to try a different cooking method, such as poaching. For example, if you have very ripe and soft plums, it might be more gentle to poach it to top your desserts.
Baking recipes with fruit
Check out lots of baking ideas with fruit, including fruit loaves, desserts and more.
Get the recipe: Anzac Biscuit Apple and Blueberry Crumble
This crumble recipe is full of classic apple and blueberry filling, but it’s topped with an amazing crunchy Anzac biscuit-inspired topping.
Get the recipe: Peach, Hazelnut and Coconut Loaf
This stunning fresh peach recipe is fantastic when you have lots of peaches in the summer. Try it out and serve it with a dollop of cream.
Get the recipe: Cheat’s Christmas Pudding
All the flavour of a traditional Christmas pudding in a fraction of the time! This cheat’s recipe is ready in just over an hour instead of taking hours to boil.
Fruit and Purees
Fruit can be found in the United States in countless types that are either imported or grown largely in California and Florida. Although the recipe’s author will typically indicate which ingredients might be changed, you can often get inventive.
Visit my website, Ugly Produce is Gorgeous, for more details about my Ugly Produce is Beautiful SM Educational Campaign.
Use whole raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, strawberries, sliced kiwi fruit, and orange slices to decorate cakes and other baked goods. They can be used to top cakes or other baked goods right before serving because they don’t brown. Raisins, currants, craisins (dried cranberries), and other varieties of dried fruit are frequently used in baking.
What causes fruit to ripen? “When amylases break down the starches into simple sugars, the fruit gets sweeter. As hydrolases degrade the chlorophyll (which gives the fruit its green hue) to disclose the anthocyanins (which give the fruit its color), the fruit turns from green to colorful. Once the acids are changed by kinases into neutral molecules, the fruit loses some of its acidic flavor. Pectinases reduce the amount of pectin, which causes the fruit to become softer. And the fruit starts to smell when hydrolases transform big organics into volatile aromatic molecules.” 11/09/2013, 1 p.m. on the Chemistry Blog
| Climacteric fruits; don’t store together in a closed container | apples, apricots, avocados, bananas, cantaloupes, figs, guava, kiwis, mangoes, nectarines, peaches, pears, plums, and tomatoes |
| Non-climacteric fruits; will only get worse with time – they tend to overripen or spoil. | cherries, grapes, limes, oranges, pineapples, and berries (blue-, black-, rasp-, straw-, etc.). |
Fresh off the tree, ababai has a thin skin and looks like a small papaya. Ababai is never eaten fresh due to its high enzyme content. Ababai is cooked for several minutes and then jarred. Its pale yellow color turns to a brilliant gold after processing. It is one of the few fruits that will not dissolve when cooked. It is superb for sautéing with vegetables, broiling on fish, and grilling on the barbecue (shish kebob). The seeds look like small raisins. Ababai trees grow for 7 1/2 to 8 years and only bear fruit for 5 years. The tree is then cut down, recycled, and must be replanted on virgin soil.
APPLES: By some estimates there may be over 10,000 different apple varieties. Apples have been in cultivation for centuries and new varieties have continually arisen or been developed. HOW TO CORE AND CUT SLICES
Apples are so versatile and can be used in so many baking recipes and desserts. Don’t be afraid to experiment.
Modern supermarket shoppers sometimes struggle with the 7 or 10 varieties typically offered, and there is much confusion. There are dessert apples (eating apples) cooking apples and good storage apples. Varieties are regional, so the availability of types will vary depending upon where you live.
SALADS
Red Delicious has a yielding texture and balanced sweetness that makes it a perfect salad apple. For something that will stay bright white longer (and not brown easily when cut) go for an Empire or a Courtland, with its thin skin and mild taste.
MEAT DISHES
Pork and duck both do well with slightly sweet apples that also have good acid. Sweet, crisp Golden Delicious, tarter Jonagold, or the big, exuberant Pink Lady work particularly well.
For beef, a very tart apple like a Granny Smith works best.
SNACKING
Red Delicious and its yellow namesake, Golden Delicious, are the classic snacking apples with a mild flavor and thin skin. But when you want a great big apply apple, go for Honey Crisp, one of the juiciest, crunchiest apples around. Tangy sweet Jonagolds – which mix the tartness of Jonathan and the gentle flavor of the Golden Delicious – offer layers of flavor.
Braeburns and Galas give good crunch with delicate aromas, and a nice balance of sweetness and acid. For nature’s equivalent of a candy bar, grab a Fuji.
ALL-PURPOSE
The Golden Delicious may be the original all-purpose apple. With a firm texture that holds up to baking and a mild flavor and sweetness, it does well in pies and tarts, as well as alongside your peanut butter. Ashmead’s Kernel, a great baking apple, also has a juiciness that earns its popularity with cider makers and a mild acidity that makes it wonderful to bite into.
Honey Crisp, with its big, juicy bite, makes a great snack and a fabulous cider. Its firm texture also gives it integrity in a pie. Though they’re great for cooking, they can also be expensive, making them best for enjoying raw.
PAIRINGS
With all pairings, acidity is the element to keep in mind. For richer desserts – pies, tarts, buttery cakes, go with more acidic apples. For more delicate sweets, go with a sweeter apple.
With cheese – a classic apple pairing – join strong cheeses, such as Parmesan, cheddar and even Roquefort, with big acid and big sweetness, such as Jazz or Honey Crisp. For softer, milder cheeses, such as Camembert or brie, go with the more delicate Fuji or Gala.