FERGUS – By day, A Fergus woman helps bring life into the world as a nurse helping deliver babies at Groves hospital.
Now, Cindy Callen is breathing new life into candy through freeze-drying.
Callen, in an interview at her Fergus home, said she got into this food trend when a friend brought her some freeze-dried candy from a place in Toronto.
“I was blown away,” Callen said. “Instead of gummy, chew candy you get like this light, airy, crunchy, melts in your mouth kind of candy. I think that it’s just a great addition to the changing candy world.”
This led to Callen getting a medium sized freeze-dryer and selling the candy through her new business Frost Bites.
Despite the name, freeze-drying candy actually involves heating the candy up to 55 C to 65 C.
“Once it’s that warm, it’ll apply a vacuum,” she explained. “Then basically that takes the moisture directly out of the candy and instead of going from a solid to a liquid to a gas, it goes from solid straight to gas which is sublimation.”
At that point is when the candy tends to puff up and “explode” which changes the texture, size and shape of the candy but it generally maintains the same flavour.
“It gives you that flavour you love but in a totally different form,” Callen said.
While this visual process happens relatively quickly, it takes several hours to thoroughly dry the candy. The size of the puff tends to depend on the ingredients and moisture content, with more moisture meaning bigger blow ups.
Not every candy works though, as some have too much oil or corn starch, as Callen discovered while experimenting after first getting her machine in late July.
For example, full chocolate doesn’t tend to work, neither do M&M’s or Sour Patch candy.
“It just kind of comes out hard and we can’t really eat it,” Callen said.
Callen said she’s seen freeze-drying become increasingly popular in stores and on social media which makes her glad to have hopped on the trend and offer something locally.
“There’s no market right now in Fergus for freeze-drying, so I can kind of monopolize it a little bit and allow people to shop locally,” Callen said, referencing some local farmers’ markets she has and plans to attend. “I’ve already had people come up and they’re like ‘finally, freeze-drying in our area. I don’t have to ship it from Toronto now.’”