Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 333 kcal | 94 kcal |
| Protein | 2.2 g | 0.6 g |
| Fat | 10.2 g | 2.9 g |
| saturated | 8.6 g | 2.4 g |
| Carbohydrate | 56 g | 15.9 g |
| sugars | 50.8 g | 14.4 g |
| Fibre | 10.2 g | 2.9 g |
| Sodium | 12 mg | 3 mg |
Estimated from the ingredients, for the finished dried product. Actual values vary with the produce you use and how far you dry it.
Ingredients
- 2.6 kg apples (about 14 medium), peeled, cored and chopped
- 2 1/2 cups coconut milk
- 4 3/4 cups applesauce
- 5/8 cup honey
- 2 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 2 1/2 teaspoons apple pie spice
- 4 3/4 tablespoons finely chopped raisins
Instructions
- Pulse the apple only until the largest pieces have gone. Coconut milk gives this leather some body and it wants keeping — blended to a foam it dries into something papery.
- Chop the raisins finer than seems necessary and fold them in at the end. A whole raisin holds a bead of syrup that is still wet when the sheet around it has finished, and that bead is where mould begins.
- Shake the tin of coconut milk hard, or warm it through, before measuring. It separates in the can, and a scoop of solid fat behaves nothing like a scoop of the watery part underneath.
- Oil the liners with a smear on a piece of paper towel rather than a pour. This mixture is greasy enough already, and a puddle of oil under the sheet stops that patch drying at all.
- Level the mixture to an even depth out to the edges, then draw a finger round the rim to pull it back a few millimetres. A puree touching the lip of the tray glues itself there.
- Dehydrate at 57 °C for 16 hours. This is a long run by leather standards because the coconut milk brings fat as well as water, and fat slows the water leaving.
- It is ready when the centre is tacky but leaves nothing on your finger, and a lifted corner brings the whole sheet with it. Coconut fat keeps it faintly greasy even when finished, so judge it on whether it holds together rather than on how it feels.
- Cut the warm sheet into strips and roll each one up in baking paper. Cold, this leather cracks along the fold instead of rolling.
- The rolls hold a month in an airtight tin or six in the freezer. Coconut fat is the limit — long before the fruit itself turns, the fat will start tasting stale.
