Preservation of Fruit and Vegetables

Preserving food has been an essential part of human life for a long time, helping people to enjoy their harvests for months and prevent them from spoiling until they're consumed later on (One Eleuthera Foundation, 2023). Today I decided to try out two popular ways of preservation: drying and pickling. Dried fruit retains the natural sweetness of fresh fruit while preserving it for much longer, so you can eat it even when the fruit is out of season. Pickling gives foods a stronger flavor while keeping them fresh and safe to eat. These methods show how people learned to make the most of their food and enjoy it in different ways.

Food preservation / ©Gubba Homestead

Preparation

On today’s menu, we have dried mango as well as pickles, but before that, there’s some important preparation to do. After washing your hands, you need to gather your containers or jars in which your products will be preserved and sterilize them properly. I washed the containers/jars in hot, soapy water (remember you still need to be able to put your hands in the water, so do not have it too hot) and rinsed them in hot water as well, but this time in really hot water to kill all the bacteria. In the last step of the preparation, I boiled the lids of the jars, and the jars go into the oven at 100 degrees for the duration of your cooking time. I, however, only put the jars in the oven after taking the mango out so I could turn the heat up to 100 degrees.

 

Dried mango

Dried mango / ©Rita Lima

I started with the dried Mango because it was the one that needed more time cooking. Here, the most important ingredient is the mango and for the seasoning, if wanted, it goes according to preference.

Ingredients:

- 1 Mango

- 1 tbsp Paprika powder

- 1 tsp Chili flakes 

Instead of going with the basic dried mango, I decided to add a little bit of paprika and chili flakes to keep the sweetness of the mango but also give it a little kick of spice. I started by peeling and cutting one mango into thin pieces. They don’t need to be perfect, and you can decide how thick you want your mango slices to be, but remember that the thicker your slices are, the longer it will take for them to dry in the oven, which was the method I used, and the thinner they are, the crispier they can get. After I was done cutting the mango, I just added paprika powder and chili flakes to my liking, mixing them together with the fruit in a bowl, and adding everything to a tray with baking paper. I put it in the oven for about 3-4 hours at about 85 degrees according to the recipe, but it also depends on your preference for the texture (Nordic Ware, 2021). 

                        Peeled and cut mango / ©Rita Lima                                                       Cut mango with seasoning / ©Rita Lima

After they were done, no more juice was visible, and they looked completely dry. I took them out of the oven and let them cool down. 

Dried mangoes in the oven / ©Rita Lima

 

Pickles 

Finished pickles / ©Rita Lima

The pickles were very quick and easy to make; they definitely took less time to prepare than the mangoes, but they kept me busy while the mangoes were in the oven.

Ingredients:

- 1 Cucumber 

- 4 Garlic cloves

- 1 tbsp Paprika powder

- 1 tbsp Black pepper seeds

- 1 tbsp dill

For the brine:

- 300ml 7% vinegar

- 300ml Water

- 3 tbsp Salt

- 2 tbsp Sugar

- 1 tsp Black pepper seeds

- 1 tsp dill

For this, I combined two recipes: one provided in class and another found online (Segal, 2025). Some cucumbers are specifically used for pickling, as I could only find the ones that are usually used for salads, for example, that's what I tried the recipe with. 

I cut up on cucumber into small half-circles, four garlic cloves, and added them to a bowl. After I moved on to the brine, I added 300ml of 7% vinegar, 300ml of water, 3 tablespoons of salt, and 2 tablespoons of sugar to a pot. Out of preference, I added 1tsp of black pepper seeds and 1 tsp of dill to the mixture itself. 

 

 

Cut cucumber and garlic / ©Rita Lima                                                                Lake mixture/ ©Rita Lima 

As the brine started boiling, I removed the jar from the oven and filled it with the raw cucumber and garlic, along with some seasonings such as paprika powder, dill, and additional black pepper seeds. To do this, I would do it in layers by adding about 3 tbsp of cucumber and garlic, then a little bit of the 3 seasonings, and then another layer of cucumber and garlic on top. Once that was done, the jar was filled with the raw cucumbers and garlic to the top, and the brine was boiling, I added the liquid to the cold vegetables in the jar, filled as much as possible, and made sure it was well sealed with the lid so no air could stay inside. 

Side note: As the vegetables themselves are not heated or cooked, and the hot brine was poured over them, it could lead to the preservation lasting less time compared to if I had actually cooked them.

Jar filled with cucumber and garlic / ©Rita Lima

Reflection

While thinking about what I wanted to try making for this first blog post, I looked up a lot of recipes and realized that pickling and drying can happen in different ways and different cooking durations. Nowadays, people use the air fryer a lot, and I learned that as long as you have it on low heat, it is possible to dehydrate fruit as well. I am very curious to learn how the preservation methods have evolved with the help of new technology. People have moved from the traditional pickling and drying to adding whichever spices they like, and so there is something for everybody. I also realized that food preservation is a long process from the preparation to the time it is ready to eat, as well as small technicalities such as needing to fill the jars to the top and keeping them closed tightly are very important so the preservation works and the food doesn't go bad.  I am eager to see how the preservation process will turn out at the end of the term.

 

Finished dried mangoes and pickles / ©Rita Lima

Conclusion

As I am writing this, it has now been 2 days since the product production. Because I was only able to make one jar of pickles, I will not be able to open it to smell and taste it until the submission date; however, I can already tell that there has been a change in the color of the cucumbers; they have become a little darker, and the texture seems to have become softer. As for the dried mangoes, I made a separate batch to give to my friends, and it doesn’t seem like there has been any change from when I sealed them in the jar. I found this to be a very interesting experience because I had never thought I would be working on trying to make food last for a long time.

Sources

Nordic Ware (2021, 12.28). Oven-baked dried mangoes. https://www.nordicware.com/recipes/oven-baked-dried-mango/

One Eleuthera Foundation (2023, 03.23). Benefits of food preservation. https://oneeleuthera.org/the-benefits-of-food-preservation/ 

Segal, J. (2025, 07.05). Quick and Easy Refrigerator Pickles. https://www.onceuponachef.com/recipes/quick-and-easy-dill-pickles.html