Guava Cheese (Pate De Fruit)
A recipe via Portuguese colony to present day Mumbai homes
Peraad (from Indian Peru/Per for Guava) or Goiabada (from Portuguese Goiba for Guava) is possibly one of my most favourite thing in the Kuswaar assemblage. Kuswaar is a plate full of Christmas goodies that Christian families in India make in the Advent period leading upto Christmas and then distribute it amongst your family and friends much like the ‘Diwali Faral’ that we see during Diwali - Festival of Lights made by my Hindu/NonHindu friends who observe this festival.
Goa was colonised by Portuguese for a long long time until their independence in 1961 and so naturally we have a lot of fusion dishes as well as recipes influenced by Portuguese cuisine that reflect this colonisation and Peraad is the beautiful result of that. Guava is available during spring but also comes into second flush of fruit during winter and hence Catholic families in India tend to make Peraad out of it during December month to use up any surplus of fruit as they tend overripe really quickly. If you are feeling fancy I reckon we could call it ‘Pate de Fruit’ as it shares same concept of cooking fruit puree with sugar until set.
This recipe uses only 3 ingredients if we don’t count salt. Fruit pulp, sugar and lime juice. Guava fruit is naturally high in pectin level and does not need any other factors to set such as gelatine or external pectin in any form etc. It is a breeze to plan but a beast to make. I am probably not selling this very well but hear me out , beast to make only if you aim for big quantities. One kilo is pretty doable and probably 2 kilo if you had to scale up. Full disclosure - I would not recommend any more than that because this recipe needs lot of stirring and muscle power especially towards the end.
Tips & Tricks
Pick yellow and very ripe guavas and try to choose all of same ripeness. Some green and some yellow may not be a good idea although we are pressure cooking it to avoid any uneven ripeness
Choose a deep pan even though quantity may be much less. As seen in my next pic I choose a wide and deeper pan (not the white one it was just to show the quantity, texture and help me measure up.) White pan shows the guavas after pressure cooking and pureeing.
Choose a long handle spatula as this mixture does tend to splatter up and its HOTTT af (from experience) !!
You can leave it natural but I have added colour that I found at the local Indian grocer
Use a square tin 8x8 or rectangle tray like I did. I ended up with thinner sized pieces which I don’t mind. For thicker pieces I would recommend square tin.
Ingredients
7 ripe guavas (roughly 1 kg), 625 gram after pureeing
500gram Caster sugar
1 tbsp unsalted or salted butter
juice of 1 lime
1/2 tsp salt
Instructions
Cut guavas into quarters and pressure cook them for one whistle (they are pretty ripe as seen in the picture but if using green guavas then cook for 2 whistles)
Once cooked I managed to scoop out seeds that were obvious and came out easily with a spoon. I didn’t bother taking them all out as it adds to the flavour anyway.
Add the cooked and deseeded guavas to a blender and puree them. I ended up with 625 grams of puree as seen in the white pan.
Optional step - I decided to sieve the puree just so I have the right consistency and get rid of bigger seeds but you can totally skip this step if you want to.
Take a deep and wide pan and boil the guava puree on medium high heat. Use a long handled spatula to avoid burns as this puree tends to splatter up. Keep stirring occasionally until it reaches boil.
Once the puree reaches a regular boil , add juice of 1 lime. This is mostly to taste and I found that to be enough for the quantity of puree I had.
Keep stirring regularly until the puree leaves the sides of the pan, it will start coming off the base easily and you will feel resistance on your spatula. Towards the end you will feel you need more muscle power to stir which means it is nearing doneness.
To test if it is done , you can take a bowl of water and put a little drop of Peraad mixture in it. You should be able to form a ball and it should be able to hold shape. This is the right time to stop and take it off the heat.
Pour it into well greased square or rectangle tin(see Tips or Tricks section)
Cut into desired shape and size. You can dust them in caster sugar before serving. I would advise not to dust with sugar if storing for longer period or making well in advance of serving. Usually Peraad is not coated with sugar but I do it because aesthetics !
You can store it an airtight container for upto a month or in freezer upto 3 months.