A nutritious snack to enjoy between meetings, the ideal snack for our children, already portioned and packed to go, a quick refill of energy for people who practice sports. Today we know that the consumption of dehydrated fruit, because it is good for us and practical, is recommended by doctors and nutritionists around the world for people who wish to adopt a healthy lifestyle or those who need a nutrient-rich diet, such as children and people who practice sports. For this reason we check the benefits of our products through constant laboratory analyses.
People very often enter questions in search engines such as: is it good or bad for you to eat dehydrated fruit? What are the benefits and contraindications of dried fruit? The answer is clearly found in our nutritional tables. They are the result of extensive studies on the finished product by a team of researchers of the University of Tuscia who we provided with a ‘mini’ version of our Soft-DRY® dehydrator.
Every 100 grams of our green kiwi, for example, contains 140 mg of Vitamin C, equal to 175% of the recommended daily intake for the average adult, in addition to high values of potassium, copper, fibre and other precious vitamins. Our pear has an elevated content of phosphorus and manganese, our strawberries are rich in calcium and magnesium. And last but not least, for the many reasons listed here, our dehydrated fruit is good. And it has a characteristic that makes it a suitable ingredient for dozens of preparations: dehydration is reversible, just add a small amount of water and it will recover most of its original consistency.
This makes it suitable for sweet and savoury recipes. We offer a few on our website, but we invite our most creative customers to help us explore the potential. We have succeeded in making an even healthier and nourishing dehydrated fruit than the traditional version. How did we do it? Thanks to a one-of-a-kind system that introduces complex slow and low temperature dehydration methods and leaves the natural properties of the food completely unchanged
We created the Soft-DRY® cold anti-oxidative dehydration method and it is truly our pride and joy, because it is the result of years of research and today it allows us to maintain very high levels of fibers, minerals and especially vitamins that are often lost in water extraction processes. By analysing products available on the market we have, in fact, discovered that the many virtues of dried or dehydrated fruit can be neutralised by processing methods that promote numbers more than quality.
With frying, microwave or traditional oven cooking, there are many methods that save companies’ time and money but that diminish the benefits of the raw material, also ruining the appearance and taste of the product. They then adjust these latter characteristics with the use of salts, sugars, colorants and preservatives. Nothing could be further from what we had in mind when we began this adventure.
When we founded mondona, we set ourselves the aim of encouraging consumers to return to nature, to genuine and healthy foods. And we immediately realised that this meant paying close attention to every detail. It would not have been enough to focus on the quality of the product, perfecting an innovative cold drying method (below 40 degrees centigrade) that was also able to avoid the primary threat to the many natural properties of fruit, i.e. oxidation. Since it would not have been enough to offer our consumers a brand new fruit on the market such as Red kiwi, or very high level dehydrated tubers such as Demeter turmeric or Demeter ginger.
We therefore set ourselves two fundamental rules, that we believe need to set the standard for all food companies today: to respect the environment and to continuously avail of scientific research. For this reason we only use organic fruit from our farms where it is harvested, hand cut, dehydrated and packaged in a single short supply chain at our facilities. We set up processing centres just a few metres from the orchards therefore we process at zero miles, eliminating any emissions that would otherwise be produced to transport the goods. Plus we are currently making our packaging 100% recyclable and compostable. But there is another factor we are particularly proud of: our industrial model produces zero waste. This means that no fruit ends up in the garbage.
We all know that large retailers throw away food with the slightest aesthetic defects, like a small black spot on a banana or a tiny bruise on an apple. This fruit is not rotten, it is just as healthy and good as the perfect-looking fruit, just less attractive to consumers. We are talking about fruit picked at the perfect ripeness, and when it is peeled it is completely healthy. We are able to make the most of its value, extending its life by more than six months without ever adding neither chemical nor natural preservatives.
Dehydrated fruit is the ideal food for the diet of children, adults, athletes and the elderly. In fact, increasingly more nutritionists recommend it instead of or to supplement fresh fruit.