False beliefs

Marmalade and preserves
›"All Preserves and Marmalades use fresh fruit"
To make a quality product one needs to use first choice products, essentially of two types:
1) Fresh fruit
2) Fruit known as "fresh frozen fruit"

It is a false belief to think that everybody uses fresh fruit or fresh frozen fruit. The reality is that most commercial products for the most part contain preparation based on fruit, concentrates or pureè, dehydrated fruits which are re-hydrated and other reproduced or chemical ingredients. There exist numerous ready-to-serve industrial products from which the consumer often ignores the existence of what is most important, the nutritional value.Fresh fruit, however, as soon as it is picked, holds two important advantages for whom produces it:

a) The necessity to work only seasonally, risking that the stock will run out and therefore having to wait for the next harvest.
b) The decomposition factor of working with fresh fruit.
Technology has, nevertheless, brought about the alternative to "fresh fruit" with "fresh frozen fruit", which maintains the original properties of the fruit intact: I.Q.F. products (Individual Quick Frozen).. This means that within 8 days of being picked, fruit by fruit is individually frozen at a temperature of –72°C, immediately blocking the decomposition process.

The results are therefore excellent under the following profile:

• the entire maintenance of the properties of the fruit
• the maintenance of the taste, colour and aroma of the fruit
• no bacteriological proliferance
• the possibility provide a "tailor-made" product for the client, even out of season

The disadvantage of course is the cost of I.Q.F. which enters company politics and deserves entirely another chapter!

Pectin is bad for you

There exist various types of pectin: The natural and the chemical. The former is good for you and which betters the product, the latter is bad for you. We, here at Pittaffo A&C., only use natural pectin. Our pectin, is a natural concentrate obtained from the rind of apples or peel of citrus fruits. Its use improves the quality of the product with its thickening properties, allowing a very short cooking time which impedes the deteriation of vitamins and completely preserves the organic properties of the fibre and fruit used. As a consequence, flavour, taste, colour and aroma remain close to that of the original fruit used.

It is a false belief that marmalades and preserves are cooked for hours and hours. The vitamins dissipate, the fibre tends to break up, the product oxidises and the sugar caramelizes. Two simple examples : a housewife takes around 2 hours to cook 3kg of jam at a temperature of 95-100°C. We cook 1200 kg of product in 20 minutes at a maximum temperature of 80°C: In your opinion, which is the better product? So, read the label and choose those products which say “natural fruit pectin” or "fruit pectin".

Cooking for a long time in an aged saucepan is better

Still today, above all in little villages near to us, some products boast about being cooked with aged or antique methods stemming from grandmother copper saucepans, sieved and ladled with wood or other kitchen tools. We believe that our antecendants surely suffered from ...stomachache! This politics of marketing feeds false belief! In reality, utensils and tools made from copper and wood are absolutely prohibited in the food industry. By law, correct production, hygenic and safe should exclusively use stainless steel AISI 304 !

Marmalade and Jams are fattening

The product is obviously going to contain sugar, but it is always a question on measures and of course, ingesting a jar of jam per day is not going to help your waistline. However, two spoonfuls of wild strawberry jam, for example, spread onto toasted bread or biscuits every morning, not only constitute a nice ending to breakfast, but also represent the advised amount for a balanced diet. Therefore it is a false belief thinking one can lose weight eating only a croissant or snack (rich in fat !) rather than a spoonful of jam spread onto bread. Our products contain a very low percentage of sugar: one spoonful contains around 10-13 calories.

Honey
There exists an entire literature behind honey: the favourite of the glutton. The consumer, nevertheless, is often deceived by the jar and tends to go for unrefined and uninviting honey.

Crystalized honey is no good

This is a false belief in vogue, above all in Italy and in Northern Europe ! The appearance of the honey depends entirely on what the bee collects. An orange honey could never be the yellow colour such as that of acacia or the dark crystalline colour of the horse chestnut. The properties of pollen that is collected to make citrus fruit or sunflower honey tend to always crystalize and compact, whereas that of acacia is similar in appearance to that of water ! Crystalization depends mainly on two factors:

Honey is like sugar

Honey does not contain sugar, another false belief! In the precious honeycomb, there is no place for saccharin, instead fructose ( very quickly produced ), glucose, mineral salts, water and pollen among other nutritive elements are found in abundance.

It is necessary to look at the "expiration" date on honey

Honey never goes off, but with time it loses its properties and it is preferable to consume it within 3 years of the production date. For now the law does not stipulate a certain expiration date on preserves (although most companies will put it on the jar), rather a production date. Let us take for instance the deceptive vendor, who has a 10 year-old honey he wants to get rid of. He would write “expiration date 2010”. Maybe another producer who has recently recieved the honey would write "expiration date 2005": At this point, the consumer, thinks that the honey with the expiration date of 2010 is fresher than that of 2005 ! This of course is a false belief! So don’t look at the expiration date which can be put on the jar at the liberty of the retailer, look at the production date and choose the most recent honeys.

The honey you are buying is produced in Italy

At this point it must be said that Italy produces a third of its food requirements internally and that its prices are generally higher than those of other foreign countries, essentially for the labour costs and for the quality of the organic properties in the products. Read the labels well! Many of the products on the shelf are not of Italian origin, rather other miscellaneous countries (Argentina, Eastern Europe, China and others...). To take nothing away from this nation, it cannot be ignored that for more than a year now, the European Community has prohibited the import of Chinese honey from which analysis has found it containing glucose syrup.

There then comes the problem of quality control, the production site, the collection and picking methods, the cultivation and the distribution: Italy adheres to rigorous riules (H.A.C.C.P.) and is subject to multiple controls, which are not enforced in other countries (excluding Japan and the United States).

Is it true that the Italian honey is the most esteemed? Yes, for the climatic and environmental conditions in Italy. Above all, for its variety and consented cultivation of a wide range of flowers, but also as the average humidity of Italy is lower than that of other countries such as those in Eastern Europe for example. In Italy, the honey matures in the beehives. In countries where the humidity is equal to or above 40% however, the honey does not mature as well therefore retaining a lot of water (up to 23%). What therefore follows is the process of "dehumidifying".

Pittaffo A&C
contrada Ciuranà
Crucoli-Torretta (KR) 88812
Tel. +39 0962.33.78.33
Fax +39 0962.33.74.85
email: info@pittaffo.it

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