Fruit cocktail is a mixture of five kinds of fruit: peaches, pears, pineapple, cherries and grapes. All these fruits undergo certain processes, which are described elsewhere on this website. During harvesting the fruits are first canned by kind. When the factory is less busy, the cans are opened and the fruits are mixed into fruit cocktail. The fruits may also be diced. Fruit cocktail generally consists of 99% peaches and pears. 

After the fruits have been mixed in the right amounts, the mixture is canned again and pasteurised. Since the fruit has now been pasteurised twice, it is usually softer than fruit canned by sort.