We have fruit trees, and end up with far more fruit than we can eat fresh, despite sharing with friends and neighbors. I go to the restaurant supply store and get a sleeve of 5 1/2 ounce individual serving cups (I pay about 5 dollars for 250, and several dollars more for lids) which means about 3 cents for a set.
We peel/cut/core the fruit (apples, peaches, pears) and cook them until they're soft enough to mash with a potato masher. We ladle the fruit sauces into the containers, put the tops on, label, and freeze. (I usually put a small amount of cinnamon sugar on some for my husband--he likes them a little sweeter than the daughters and I; otherwise, we use no sugar.)
When we are packing lunches, we grab a frozen fruit cup and put it in the lunch box. It helps to keep the lunch cool until lunch time, and is usually thawed by lunch. (I like it still partially frozen!)
The disposable cups are not the most "green" solution; but we have moved to as many reusable containers as possible, as well as using cloth napkins and garage sale cutlery in our lunches, so I like to think we are offsetting our carbon footprint, as well as using the precious fruit.
By Jilson from Pennsylvania
By
09/11/2008
I've been using the same set of half-pint, wide mouth (imagine what that would look like) jars for individual servings for about twenty years. Thanks for the tip, there are some lonesome peaches in my refrig now.
By
09/10/2008
This is a lot greener solution than buying these individual servings. Perhaps you will find recyclable containers you can use instead. I have a few things in my cupboard that would be the appropriate size, but I can't remember what I originally got in them.
By
09/11/2008
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