Fruit Leather

I tried my hand at fruit leather the other day. One of my many ideas for eating healthy yet economically. There is a ton of sugar, not to mention other weird things I can't pronounce, in fruit roll ups which happens to be a favorite treat of the boys. This idea would go a lot smoother if the fruit was cheap, ripe and plentiful here on Guam but that's not the case. Most of the fruit that we are used to in the states is picked before ripe, some of flash frozen and shipped out here only to go bad upon the first day of purchase. Very frustrating! I had some strawberries that I had already cut up from dinner the night before that needed to be consumed before they ended up at the bottom of the trash can. I pureed them in the food processor, added a Tbs of honey and spread it evenly onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. I was supposed to spray it lightly with oil but I forgot. It didn't seem to matter though since it came off easy enough. I don't own a dehydrator so I decided to use the oven. The oven should have been set for 150 but my oven only goes to 170 degrees. It takes anywhere from 4-8 hours, rotating the sheet every hour to keep from drying out an area to much...which I did! For the second trial I used peaches. I peeled, pitted and quartered 4 peaches then tossed them with a little lemon juice to preserve the color. If you are using apples or apricots you should do this as well. I pureed, added a little honey to taste then spread it out on a parchment lined sheet. You'll know the fruit leather is done when it is no longer sticky. Make sure you roll it up when it's still warm. It will keep in the refrigerator for 3 weeks.