On Food and Cooking

(Barry) #1
blender,    several minutes or  more.
Straining through a sieve or cheesecloth
removes the large particles, and forcing
the puree through a fine mesh breaks
large particles into smaller ones.
Heating softens cell walls so that they’ll
break into smaller pieces, and shakes
loose long-chain carbohydrates from the
cell walls and gets them into the watery
phase, where they can act as separate
starch and gelatin molecules do.
Freezing a puree and then thawing it
causes ice crystals to damage cell walls,
which can help liberate more pectin and
hemicellulose molecules into the liquid.

A fruit or vegetable puree. Grinding plant
tissue turns it inside out, freeing the cell

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