Fruit trimmings are edible offcuts and pieces generated during destemming, peeling and cutting operations, and are typically diverted to juice, puree or other valorisation streams to maximise raw material use.
In trade practice
During processing, trimmings are collected separately from the main product stream and weighed to support yield calculations. Quality teams check that trimmings diverted to secondary streams such as puree or concentrate meet the microbiological and compositional requirements of those downstream products. A common oversight is allowing trimmings to accumulate at ambient temperature before transfer, which raises microbial risk. Suppliers processing under food safety certification schemes are expected to document trimming handling as part of their waste and by-product controls.
In a specification
Where a contract covers both primary frozen or dried product and secondary puree or concentrate, it should specify which trimming grades are acceptable for each stream and any maximum time or temperature limits for holding trimmings before further processing.