Ukrainian farmers and craft producers are following consumer trends. Recently, a new product appeared on the market - sweet grape juice Fruit Leather without sugar

A healthy lifestyle is one of the drivers of the food market. In particular, the demand for healthy sweets is growing.

Tatiana Shmaglyuchenko, director of the company "VIN‘ S "(Odessa region), specializing in table grapes, tried to find useful sweets for her son, but did not find a product in stores that would be 100% natural and tasty enough. Therefore, the owner of the vineyards decided to create such a product on her own. And she succeeded. Now Tatiana produces goodies not only for the family but also for sale.

Tatiana Shmaglyuchenko has long worked in Kyiv in finance. And living in the capital, she wondered why it is so difficult to find delicious fruits and berries, to which she is accustomed at home, in the Odessa region. Now she grows tasty and sweet table grapes, sends it to the customers in boxes under the brand name "Balmy Valley".

On the 10-hectare vineyard, where you can see the sea and the resort village of Sergiyivka, now grows a whole range of varieties: with white, blue, pink grapes. This is the result of almost 10 years of work of two generations of the Shmaglyuchenko family.

"This year's discovery for me was a grape juice fruit leather. It was a gamble and an impromptu. My son doesn't like thin fruit leather, and I don't like the one available in every store. Sometimes home negotiations require sweet currency, and you need to put something sweet in school. Why not grapes? Raisins are tasty but not convenient, it should be something delicious and small, which is convenient to open and eat. We decided to make a thick fruit leather - unusual, aromatic and sweet. I usually eat Jupiter grapes, for me it is dense, although it contains most of the vitamins, antioxidants and anthocyanins. And here we managed to preserve it and this even enriched the taste," said Tatiana Shmaglyuchenko.

The equipment for processing grapes, particularly an infrared dryer, was received by the farmer thanks to the support of the Ukrainian Fruit and Vegetable Business Development Project (UHBDP).

The experiments began: I dried everything - fruits, vegetables, berries - cubes and slices. The most delicious for me were slices of strawberry, melon, peach and grape.

Tatiana Shmaglyuchenko

In the craft volume, grape marshmallow is produced in Ukraine - here Tatiana Shmaglyuchenko is not an innovator. But it has the main advantage - its own and homogeneous raw materials.

Now Tatiana produces white and black raisins, as well as fruit leather. The price is 100 UAH per 200 grams. Tatyana sells her craft products online.

Now she wants to develop the business to attract tourists, especially since there is a vineyard in the resort area. In particular, plans to plant technical varieties and create a mini-winery.