North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Mark Angermayer" <hangermayer@isp.com>]

Michael,

That's astounding.  Why would jam companies go to the trouble of bleaching
the berries first, then recoloring them?  If they want darker jam, why don't
they just add food coloring?

It sounds strangely like urban legends I've heard in the ag industry.  Like
the one, milk is full of antibiotics  (My wife (who works in the dairy
industry) tells me they test each load before it's unloaded.  If they find
antibiotics, the whole semi-load is dumped.)  Bleaching strawberries and
recoloring them is so weird, if I hadn't heard of it from you, I'd never
believed it.

Mark
KS
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Michael Dossett
To: North American Fruit Explorers
Sent: Monday, March 09, 2009 12:35 PM
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Jam too sweet?


Unfortunately, bleaching the strawberries and then adding red dye to make
them an even color is an all too common practice.  Not all the jam companies
do this, but many if not most do.  I think part of it depends on where the
berry comes from and what variety it is too.  A lot of the jam processors
use California strawberries.  The growers there make their real money on the
berries from the first and second pick for the fresh market because of their
size.  I can't remember what the price was that way but I want to say it was
around 75 cents a pound.  The tertiary and quaternary berries on each raceme
are smaller and are almost worthless to them so they dump them on the
processing market for around 19 cents a pound just to get a little something
for them.  A lot of the jam and yogurt etc. processors use these berries
because of the cost.

Oregon and Washington strawberries, in part because of climate and in part
because of genetics, have good color throughout the fruit, i.e. they aren't
white inside like California ones.  They are also darker red than the
strawberries from the eastern half of the US.  A few processors still like
these berries in part because of flavor but also in part because of the
color so they don't have to add the dyes etc.  Unfortunately because of a
shorter season and higher labor costs our growers can barely make a go of it
at 50 cents a pound for a processing berry which means that the acreage here
in the Pacific Northwest has been steadily shrinking.  It is basically
because of the few remaining processors here that the strawberry breeding
programs in Oregon and Washington place a large emphasis on selecting for
fruit color both internally and externally before a new variety gets
released.

Michael

Michael Dossett Corvallis, Oregon www.Mdossettphoto.com