Fruit Pasteurization

[Yacov327]

There are a lot of old threads on this but I didn't really want to revive a dead one so here it is.

Lots of debate on this topic I know. It seems to be though that if you are wanting to pasteurize your own fruit puree, the most widely accepted way to do it is with campden tablets.

Recently I pasteurized some strawberry puree I made on the stove (160 for 15 min). However I decided I needed a couple more pounds and I have 6 pounds of peach puree I made which I would like to pasteurize.

If I want to use heat rather than campden (I know hazy beer! Oh no!) could I just do it in the microwave? Has anyone had experience with this?

Some light reading for you...
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/food-science/microwave-processing
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/9b66/f695859ee344e74a26554a491c804c8519e8.pdf
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3547058/

I can say that I did not make it through all of those studies but found aspects of them informative.

 

[RPh_Guy]

could I just do it in the microwave?

Heat will kill the microbes regardless of how it makes it's way into the fruit. As long as you hold temp for the required number of PUs (what, 700ish or more?), it'll be fine.
Actually getting a consistent temperature throughout and holding it there might be difficult with a microwave. Sounds like more of a pain than using the stove.

I'm sure you've already heard that heat may change the fruit flavor, which is why sulfites are typically used.

I don't make fruit beer so I didn't vote