Frozen or canned fruits for muffins ?

[ShuBunny]

Hi folks!

Between using frozen or canned fruits for muffins - which will give more consistent results? eg: blueberry muffins - \
The cost of Fresh blueberries is pretty prohibitive here.

Frozen
I've read that frozen blueberries should be used Frozen, not thawed.
Is coating them with flour before mixing them in beneficial?
Will there be less streaks?
The frozen blue berries here are usually coated in blueberry juice from the humidity during transportation and sometime freeze up in a chunk of ice...

Canned
generally very sweet, since it is stored in sugar syrup. Can i get away with rinsing them and drying them before use?

Look forward to your thoughts.

Thanks everyone.

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Hi folks!

Between using frozen or canned fruits for muffins - which will give more consistent results? eg: blueberry muffins - \
The cost of Fresh blueberries is pretty prohibitive here.

Frozen
I've read that frozen blueberries should be used Frozen, not thawed.
Is coating them with flour before mixing them in beneficial?
Will there be less streaks?
The frozen blue berries here are usually coated in blueberry juice from the humidity during transportation and sometime freeze up in a chunk of ice...

Canned
generally very sweet, since it is stored in sugar syrup. Can i get away with rinsing them and drying them before use?

Look forward to your thoughts.

Thanks everyone.

Canned fruit works better in a pie, cobbler, or crisp because the fruit is both soft and sweet from the heat and sugar syrup that it is stored in.

Frozen fruit works better in quick breads, muffins, and scones since the fruit is still soft, but and not sweetened.

frozen fruit will bleed color into the batter. With the blueberries if you gently rinse them, pat them dry between paper towels, then gently toss to lightly coat with either flour or tapioca starch, they will not bleed as much into the batter.

 

[ShuBunny]

Awesome! Thank you @Norcalbaker59.

 

[ShuBunny]

Here's the frozen blueberry vs fresh blueberry outcome.
really happy with the outcome.

blueberries if you gently rinse them, pat them dry between paper towels, then gently toss to lightly coat with either flour or tapioca starch, they will not bleed as much into the batter.

1. rinse
2. pat dry
3. threw them back in FREEZER with colander while prepping batter.
4. when muffin batter was ready, shook 30g of berries in 1/2 tsp flour.
5. stir them through batter very quickly.
6. there was ONLY a thin halo of blue streak around the frozen berry. after baking and with the berries exploding, it's not discernable.
7. Frozen berry
   

Fresh blueberries.

1. 

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Here's the frozen blueberry vs fresh blueberry outcome.
really happy with the outcome.

1. rinse
2. pat dry
3. threw them back in FREEZER with colander while prepping batter.
4. when muffin batter was ready, shook 30g of berries in 1/2 tsp flour.
5. stir them through batter very quickly.
6. there was ONLY a thin halo of blue streak around the frozen berry. after baking and with the berries exploding, it's not discernable.
7. Frozen berryView attachment 3922

Fresh blueberries.

1. View attachment 3921

Congratulations! let me say that one more time. Congratulations! because that is as good as it gets with frozen berries.

You cannot get a better result with frozen berries. I think those look beautiful. And you know what— I don’t think very many people are going to realize that those are frozen berries.

 

[ShuBunny]

Thanks @Norcalbaker59
And I just realised that I mislabelled the muffins. Second pic is the frozen blueberries.
So it is really hard to tell visually!
Taste-wise, texture feels identically since these berries are small.

Maybe I got lucky with these batch of 3-muffins. Could do everything super quick.
Will trial frozen berries with a batch of dozen. Fingers crossed!

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Congratulations! let me say that one more time. Congratulations! because that is as good as it gets with frozen berries.

You cannot get a better result with frozen berries. I think those look beautiful.

Thanks @Norcalbaker59
And I just realised that I mislabelled the muffins. Second pic is the frozen blueberries.
So it is really hard to tell visually!
Taste-wise, texture feels identically since these berries are small.

Maybe I got lucky with these batch of 3-muffins. Could do everything super quick.
Will trial frozen berries with a batch of dozen. Fingers crossed!

Hahaha—there you, can’t tell the difference. When good technique is used in preparation it really makes a difference in the quality of your product. Most bakers just want to dump the frozen berries into the batter. some will go to the trouble to rinse the berries and pat them dry. But the extra step in coating in starch to Absorb the extra moisture is really necessary. And I think you were wise to store them in the freezer until the batter was ready. I’m going to add that step to my process.

I don’t know if you can freeze the berries for long with starch on them, especially unprocessed flour. If you going to freeze, I would use tapioca starch.

Edit: actually the frozen berry muffin looks better

 

[ShuBunny]

I don’t know if you can freeze the berries for long with starch on them, especially unprocessed flour. If you going to freeze, I would use tapioca starch.

I'll bear in mind tapioca starch for freezing. Thanks again @Norcalbaker59

To stop the berries from thawing more, I froze the rinse & towel dried berries in a colander/sieve while I made the batter. there was still excess water/juice dripping out, about 1 tbsp during freezing. So the sieve is a must.

Once batter was all mixed, I remove berries from freezer & tossed them in flour, then stirred floured berried into batter.

I did not freeze the flour coated berries.

 

[Norcalbaker59]

I'll bear in mind tapioca starch for freezing. Thanks again @Norcalbaker59

To stop the berries from thawing more, I froze the rinse & towel dried berries in a colander/sieve while I made the batter. there was still excess water/juice dripping out, about 1 tbsp during freezing. So the sieve is a must.

Once batter was all mixed, I remove berries from freezer & tossed them in flour, then stirred floured berried into batter.

I did not freeze the flour coated berries.

Perfect @ShuBunny.

 

[ShuBunny]

hi folks,

writing back to say - do not in the name of saving paper towels, DO NOT omit step 2.

1. rinse in cool tap water -- get rid of all the icy bits clinging to berries
2. pat dry -- with a paper towel
3. threw them back in FREEZER with colander while prepping batter -- so that they don't thaw further & any excess liquid drains away.
4. when muffin batter is 75% ready, shook 30g of berries in 1/2 tsp flour -- reserve 1-2 tsp of flour from your recipe for this, try not to add extra flour to your recipe.
5. stir them through batter very quickly -- sprinkle the blueberries even over batter and fold quickly.

GOOD LUCK.

 

[Cahoot]

@ShuBunny I love being able to use frozen fruits both for the lowered cost and availability any time of the year. Thanks for posting your instructions here!

 

[ShuBunny]

Thanks! Creds to Norcal for providing the basis of my experiment. <3