Help! Did I pack my dried fruit incorrectly?

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Help! Back in February I bought a bunch of commercially dried fruit: raisins, apples, apricots, etc. I packed them in mason jars with oxygen absorbers, layering the different fruits for variety and eye appeal (thinking I might give some away as gifts). I just checked on them, and all looks good *except* for the raisins. They seemed to have grown "bumps" on them....can't tell if they are sugar clusters because of the moisture. Are my fruits still edible? Thanks in advance for your input!

-- Zoe (a@a.a), June 21, 1999

Answers

Zoe....

To can rasins for long-term storage you must start with the 'low moisture' variety (5% or less). Regular raisins would not qualify as such and it is hard to say what has happened to them-not good I suspect.

-- Barry (barryjaynes@usenvitech.com), June 21, 1999.


Barry~ Thanks for your reply. Funny thing is, one of the other jars that had *just* raisins in it (instead of a variety) of fruits looked fine. Could it be that the raisins absorbed the moisture from the other fruits? And will I encounter this with other dried fruits too? I didn't know there was such a thing as *low moisture* fruits!

-- Zoe (a@a.a), June 22, 1999.

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