Strawberry Fruit Roll-Ups Recipe

A square of homemade strawberry fruit roll-up with star cut-out. — Serious Eats / Sarah Jane Sanders

In This Recipe

Why It Works

A combination of dried pears or apples and freeze-dried strawberries gives the finished roll-ups the appropriate mild fruit flavor.
Adding corn syrup and straining the mixture makes for a flexible, smooth texture.

Scarfing down a sugary snack without preamble definitely gets the job done, but a little delayed gratification really amps up the satisfaction of certain sweets. These sweets seem to demand a little ritual and thought: Twisting and licking an Oreo, wearing a Fudge Stripe like an edible ring, punching out the middle of a Reese's peanut butter cup, or folding and nibbling a Fruit Roll-Up into a fruity snowflake.

Fruit Roll-Up Preference

Fruit Roll-Up connoisseurs hold to a number of schools of thought when it comes to the best method for consumption. Some had avant-garde fathers who'd spread peanut butter over a strawberry Fruit Roll-Up, then re-roll it as some sort of kiddie maki. Traditionalists went with the fold-and-bite method, riddling them with scalloped holes, while fruity origami practitioners folded and shaped Fruit Roll-Ups into three-dimensional designs. The Tyler Durdens among us crumpled them into a ball of fruit, just to destroy something beautiful.

Some wrapped Roll-Ups around an index finger while others rolled them into tubes or makeshift straws. Oh, you have not experienced artificial fruit flavor until you've had Kool-Aid through a coordinating Fruit Roll-Up straw.

But for me, nothing could beat Fruit Roll-Ups with the pull-out shapes. Call it a lack of imagination on my part, but I took immense pleasure in gentling peeling out the designs. Sometimes I'd slap them on my arm as a sugary tattoo, though I didn't actually care that much about the shapes themselves. Rather, I had a thing for the negative space they left behind.

However, I did have a bit of a preference for the pizza themed Fruit Roll-Ups which came out during the height of Ninja Turtle Mania. I remember dutifully peeling out tiny mushrooms and micro-rounds of pepperoni to place atop the "crust", all while sitting about three inches from the television and hanging on Raphael's every word. Having a crush on a ninja turtle and routinely eating my body weight in strawberry "pizza" probably goes a long way to explain the BraveTart trajectory.

Making the Base

The problem with homemade Fruit Roll-Ups (or their cousin Fruit by the Foot) doesn't have to do with making them, so much as it has to do with giving yourself permission to make them. Look at recipes online and you'll find no one has resisted the urge to transform them from nutritionally abysmal morsels of junk food into naturally sweetened, dietitian-approved health food items.

A partially unrolled strip of homemade strawberry fruit roll-ups. — Serious Eats / Sarah Jane Sanders

Healthiness and dessert don't have to be mutually exclusive, but at the intersection of the two, Fruit Roll-Ups become fruit leather. I respect that some people want to cut sugar from their diet, but I don't want a FRINO (Fruit Roll-Up In Name Only). I want a sugar fest in bright, cheery colors that tastes like I remember.

If you want to make healthy, low sugar fruit snacks get outta here now. This is loaded with sugar and corn syrup, mostly pears with just a teensy amount of actual strawberries, and the fiber is strained out. Now you're probably wondering, "Why not use 100% strawberries?" Because then you'd just be reconfiguring strawberries into a 2D shape, not recreating a proper Fruit Roll-Up.

Real Fruit Roll-Ups rely on pears as the base, but dried apple rings work well and seem more widely available. Use what you can find. The point is to make a mild flavored fruit the bulk of the mix and then to use a small amount of freeze dried fruit to flavor it appropriately. I went for strawberry, but use any kind of freeze dried fruit you like. The splash of rose flower water gives the roll-ups a kind of floral nuance a bit like the odd flavor of the cellophane wrapper, but leave it out if it's not important to you.

Now, if only I had some tiny pizza-topping shaped cutters...

Please note, all measurements are in weights, as volume measures can be very imprecise. I strongly recommend using a scale for all pastry projects. Serious Eats' recommended kitchen scale is the Oxo Good Grips Scale with Pull Out Display.

March 2012

Strawberry Fruit Roll-Ups Recipe

Prep 30 mins

Cook 10 hrs 30 mins

Active 30 mins

Total 11 hrs

Makes 16 roll-ups

12 ounces dried pears or apple, roughly chopped
24 ounces apple juice, divided
12 ounces sugar
6 ounces corn syrup
1.2 ounces (1 bag) freeze dried strawberries or other fruit
1 ounce lemon juice
3/4 ounce coconut oil, or other neutral flavored oil
1/2 teaspoon rose flower water
A few drops of food coloring (optional)

For the Fruit Purée: Combine chopped dried fruit with 12 ounces of apple juice, sugar and corn syrup in a medium pot. Bring to a simmer and cook until fruit has become tender and the mixture has become extremely dry and thick.
Meanwhile, in the bowl of a food processor, pulse freeze-dried strawberries until reduced to a powder.

When fruit has finished cooking, add the mixture to the strawberry powder in food processor bowl. Pulse until chunky. Add remaining apple juice, lemon juice, coconut oil, rose flower water, and food coloring, if using. Processes continuously until mixture has become quite smooth and no large chunks remain.
For the most authentic Fruit Roll-Ups, pass this fruit mixture through a food mill or a sieve and discard any solids that won't pass through (about 3 ounces). It'll take some elbow grease, but you'll be rewarded with some freakishly smooth roll-ups.
To Dry the Roll-Ups: Preheat oven to 150°F (65°C), or as low as your oven will go. Line two sheet pans with silicon mats (I've read microwave-safe plastic wrap works too, but I haven't tested that myself). Pour half the mixture into each and spread into an even, thin layer with an offset spatula.
Dry roll-ups in the oven for 6 to 10 hours. I know that's a big window, but all ovens differ wildly in how low of a temperature they can achieve. The time it takes will depend on your lowest oven temperature and roll-up preferences. In any event, you want to dry the fruit purée until it is perfectly dry to the touch and not at all squishy when pressed firmly. You should be able to peel up a corner and tug gently without the roll-up tearing.
Cut and Store the Roll-Ups: When the fruit purée has dried adequately, remove from oven and cool to room temperature. Use a knife to loosen fruit sheets from the edges of the pan. Press a sheet of parchment or wax paper against the surface of fruit and invert onto a cutting board. Peel off plastic wrap or silicon from the bottom.
If you want to make shapes for "pull outs," use the tip of a knife to gently score each sheet into 8 square portions (this will prevent you from stamping shapes that will accidentally get cut in half when you portion out the roll-ups). Next, use a cookie cutter to stamp various shapes, but do not remove them.
Next, whether you're making pull outs or not, place a fresh sheet of plastic wrap over the exposed fruit. Use the tip of a chef's knife to cut through plastic wrap, fruit and parchment, dividing each fruit sheet into 8 squares. For Fruit by the Foot, just cut each large sheet into 8 long strips instead. Either way, roll them up and store in an airtight container for about one week at room temperature.

Special Equipment

Food processor, sieve, silicon mat

Ingredients

Special Equipment

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