How to Make Apple Fruit Leather

Are you ready to make the best apple fruit leather you have ever tasted? My pumpkin spice applesauce fruit leather recipe features the perfect mix of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, ground cloves, and the zest and juice of one orange.

Enjoy this pumpkin spice apple fruit leather all year round, not just in the fall. Munch on it while hiking down the trail or rehydrate it back into applesauce with hot or cold water. Trust me; you’ll want a large serving of this amazing, all-natural dessert when you kick back around the campfire.

Before we get started, keep in mind that you can make this pumpkin spice applesauce recipe without dehydrating it into apple fruit leather. It’s a delicious side item served chunky style with pancakes or pork chops, or blended into applesauce for an everyday, healthy treat.

Apple Fruit Leather Ingredients

This recipe produces three apple fruit leathers.

Servings: 3

Ingredients:

• 6 medium apples, 2¼ lbs. (1 k) before trimming
• 1 medium orange, juice and zest (2 Tbsp. to 4 Tbsp.) *
• 1 Tbsp. turbinado sugar
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
• ¼ tsp. ground ginger
• ¼ tsp. ground nutmeg
• ⅛ tsp. ground cloves
• Pinch salt

* Alternatively, substitute the juice and zest of one lemon in place of the orange.

If you switch to a larger pot, you can make a larger quantity of applesauce to fill all of your dehydrator trays.

Double the recipe: To make 6 fruit leathers, use 12 apples, 2 oranges, 2 Tbsp. sugar, 2 tsp. cinnamon, ½ tsp. ginger, ½ tsp. nutmeg, ¼ tsp. cloves, and a pinch of salt.

Triple the recipe: To make 9 fruit leathers, use 18 apples, 3 oranges, 3 Tbsp. sugar, 3 tsp. cinnamon, ¾ tsp. ginger, ¾ tsp. nutmeg, ⅓ tsp. cloves, and a pinch of salt.

Steps for Making Apple Fruit Leather

Making and dehydrating apple fruit leather is easy. All you have to do is cut up the apples, cook them in a saucepot with the seasonings, blend them into applesauce, and spread the mixture thinly on dehydrator trays.

Photo: Six apples cut into quarters with cores cut out.

Here are the step-by-step instructions:

1. Wash apples, cut into quarters, and remove the cores. For increased nutrition and flavor, leave the skin on.

Photo: Apples cut into pieces in large saucepan.

2. Cut the apple quarters into smaller pieces and place them in a large saucepan.

Photo: Grating the peel of one orange.

3. Wash the orange, grate the peel over the apples, and then juice the orange. Organic is a good choice to avoid pesticides. A medium-sized orange will produce between two and four tablespoons of juice. Add all of it to the apples.

Tip: To avoid bitterness, grate the orange lightly to remove just the orange color and not the lighter-colored pith.

Photo: Apples with pumpkin spices, orange zest, and juice before cooking.

4. Add pumpkin spices to apples and stir them to coat evenly.

5. Keeping the lid on the saucepan, bring apples slowly to a boil for just a minute until steaming. Reduce heat to low simmer for twenty minutes, with the lid on.

6. Let cooked apples sit covered in saucepan off the heat to continue the melding of the pumpkin spices and apples.

Tip: If you have the time, refrigerate the cooked apples overnight and the flavors will really pop the next day when you blend and dehydrate the apples into apple fruit leather.

Photo: Cooked pumpkin spice apples before blending into applesauce. These were stored in the fridge overnight.

Dehydrating Apple Fruit Leather

7. Once cooled, run the cooked apples through a blender to a smoothie-like texture.

Photo: This apple fruit leather recipe makes about 32 ounces of applesauce (840 g) .

8. Place 1⅓ cups of applesauce on each of three nonstick dehydrator sheets and spread thinly between ⅛-inch to ¼-inch thick.

Photo: 1⅓ cup of applesauce (280 g) spread thinly on Excalibur dehydrator tray.

9. Dehydrate apple fruit leather at 135°F (57°C) for approximately 6−7 hours or longer if it is still tacky.

Tip: When leather is almost dry, after 5−6 hours, flip it over onto a mesh sheet and peel off the nonstick sheet. This ensures that the bottom of the apple fruit leather will be as dry as the top side.

Dehydrated applesauce leather will be pliable without any sticky or moist spots. The center will dry a little slower than the edges. When it's dry, you should be able to fold or roll it up without the leather cracking.

Photo above: Apple fruit leather flipped over, peeling off nonstick sheet.

Photo: Dehydrated apple fruit leather.

Packing & Storing Apple Fruit Leather

Photo: Folding apple fruit leather in parchment paper.

Packing

Apple fruit leather will stick to itself if you don’t fold or wrap it in parchment paper or plastic wrap.

To pack apple fruit leather like fruit rollups, place the fruit leather on top of parchment paper and roll it up. Cut the rolled up fruit leather into sections of desired widths using scissors.

My preferred fruit leather packing method is to fold the leather into three or four columns using parchment paper as shown in the photo above.

Photo: Apple fruit leather folded in parchment paper for the trail.

Storing

The last step is to fold the wrapped apple fruit leather in half. You can store three folded fruit leathers in one sandwich-sized Ziploc bag.

At home, store wrapped fruit leather in an airtight container to keep it from absorbing moisture from the air. Refrigeration will extend shelf life.

On the trail, properly dried apple fruit leather will last a month or more if kept sealed in a Ziploc bag.

Rehydrating Pumpkin Spice Applesauce Leather

Apple fruit leather rehydrates almost instantly into creamy applesauce with hot water. With cold water, it takes 10−15 minutes to rehydrate with spirited stirring.

Photo: One apple fruit leather (50 g) torn into pieces. Rehydrate with one cup of hot water.

Tear one apple fruit leather into pieces. Use the parchment paper it was wrapped in as a sanitary work surface.

Ingredients:

• 1 apple fruit leather (50 g)
• 1 cup hot or cold water. (236 ml)

On the Trail:

Place torn fruit leather pieces into a bowl and pour in hot or cold water. Stir until smooth.

Alternatively, you can add the torn pieces to the hot water in the pot.

One other method is to add water to the torn pieces in a Ziploc freezer bag. Once the bag is cool enough to handle, squeeze or knead it until you get a smooth applesauce consistency.

Photo: Pumpkin spice applesauce fruit leather rehydrated with hot water. Yum!

You’re going to love having this wonderful snack in your pack. If you eat it in leather form, take your time chewing it so those pumpkin spices and apple flavors juice up in your mouth. If you can make it to dinnertime, hot pumpkin spice applesauce is an amazing dessert to top off a great backpacking meal.

FAQ about Apple Fruit Leather

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