Have you ever found yourself with an abundance of seasonal produce and wished your family could enjoy its taste and health benefits year round? Perhaps you’ve thought about canning, but find the process is labor-intensive or frightening because of the risk of contamination with dangerous bacteria. Canned foods require a lot of production time, supplies, and storage space, and many of their nutrients may be boiled out during the canning process.

Benefits of Drying Food at Home

Next to fresh produce, home-dehydrated fruits and vegetables are the most nutritious available! While dried fruits sold at stores may contain sulfur and other additives, you can dry them at home without adding anything at all. You simply wash them, slice them (if necessary), and place them in the dehydrator! Sugar isn’t needed, because when the water is removed from fresh fruit, its natural sugars are more concentrated. Similarly, dehydrated vegetables may taste slightly salty without any extra salt added, because of the concentration of their natural flavor. Dehydrated fruits and vegetables have a delicious, fresh taste.

While preserved foods from the grocery store may contain additives and chemicals, which are increasingly being implicated in health problems such as cancer and birth defects, you can eliminate these completely by dehydrating food at home. Dried at low settings, dehydrated produce loses almost none of its nutritional value. As evidence of the freshness of dehydrated foods, a tomato seed dehydrated at a low setting, when planted, will grow into a tomato plant!

The ease of dehydrating foods at home has already been implied. There is no need to blanch or cook anything or to treat the food in any other way.

Home dehydration is also economical. While the biggest cost may be your initial investment in the dehydrator itself, these machines typically are inexpensive to operate, adding only pennies to your electric bill for each hour of operation. In addition, consider the money that you can save by not buying expensive out-of-season produce or other store-bought alternatives. You can take advantage of seasonal produce on sale at the grocery store and vegetables from your own garden! Produce at the grocery store (bananas, for example) may be marked down because it is fully ripe, and you can buy it in large quantities and preserve it at peak ripeness. In addition, dehydrating is a great way to prevent waste and preserve leftovers.

Another advantage is that dehydrated foods have a higher shelf life than canned or frozen foods. In fact, dried and stored correctly, dehydrated produce will last years and years! Also, it takes up very little space on the shelf. Typically, four to five pounds of produce will weigh only one pound dehydrated, and go from occupying a large barrel to only a small bag.

What Can I Dehydrate?

The simple answer is, almost anything! The only exception is fat, which tends to spoil, so avocadoes are not the best produce to dry.

Suggestions for fruits and vegetables that dry well can be found on the shelves of your grocery store. Grapes (raisins), plums (prunes), apples, pears, peaches, apricots, pineapples, bananas, tomatoes, and herbs of all kinds are popular options that dry very well. So are cherries, dates, nectarines, papayas, strawberries, and onions. Find out what sorts of dried foods you like best by experimentation! It is always interesting to take a new food and find out what it looks and tastes like with most of its water content removed!

Dried produce tastes great alone, but can be eaten many other ways. It can be re-hydrated by simply adding water. It can be ground into powders and used in soups and sauces, or flavorings in other dishes. Fruit can be processed in a blender, spread on a sheet of plastic, and enjoyed as fruit leather. You can experiment by mixing different fruits for different flavors of leather. Though dehydrated fruits taste great alone, for a change they can be candied in a dehydrator with honey or sugar for a special treat. You can make your own onion powder spice by dehydrating and pulverizing onions. In fact, all your excess garden herbs can be dried and added to your spice rack.

But dehydrating is by no means limited to fruits and vegetables! You can also dry meat and fish to make jerky (with certain extra precautions, of course, to prevent their fats from becoming rancid). In fact, many people buy dehydrators because they want a way to preserve meat during hunting season. Grains, nuts, and seeds can be dried to increase their shelf life. Fruit-flavored yogurt can be dried to make a kind of taffy. Dehydrators can be used in the making of yeast breads, cheese, and yogurt. You can make granola or dry bread crumbs. It is also possible to re-crisp graham crackers, chips, and other bought items should they become stale.

Finally, your dehydrator can be used for non-food craft items. You can make decorations with dried fruits, potpourri, and dried flowers, following special craft instructions. You can also dry dough art and macramé beads.

Purchasing Your Dehydrator

Before deciding to buy a dehydrator, some people experiment with other drying methods. Yes, you can dry food in the sun, as our ancestors did, but only in the most perfect of weather conditions (and absence of pests). You can dry using a homemade machine, or in your oven, but the results will be inferior to using a device designed specifically for dehydrating. If you use a home oven, there is no system for circulating dry air, and food will dry at uneven rates and temperatures. Your oven will be monopolized for hours or days, and the oven door must be left slightly open, which wastes energy.

Though small, inexpensive dehydrators can sometimes be found at department stores, if you are serious about preserving food in large quantities and for long periods of time, you should probably invest in a quality model. The easiest way to find one is to perform an online search. Excalibur and L’Equip are popular quality models.

You should look for a dehydrator with its heating element on the back or side, with a fan for circulating dry air through the system. Dehydrators with heating elements at the bottom don’t produce a uniform drying environment and yield inferior results (similar to using a home oven). Look for a dehydrator with a thermostat control.

Optimal temperature for dehydrating foods while maintaining their nutritional value is between 115 and 120 degrees. Find out what the trays inside are made of. Fiberglass or stainless steel trays are safest. Plastic may melt at high temperatures. If trays in a low-temperature dehydrator are made of plastic, make sure that it is nontoxic plastic, as it could accidentally leach into the food if the temperature rises too high.

Also consider your own personal preferences. If you will be dehydrating large quantities of food, buy a model with eight or nine trays. If you will be drying small quantities only, you may prefer a five-tray model. Consider where you will keep the dehydrator, and how much counter space you have.

At the recommended lower dehydrating temperatures, the dehydrator becomes warm to the touch, but not hot enough to burn anyone. It can be left running for at least three days at a time. Dehydrator fans generate a low hum, like other fans, but the sound is not likely to be bothersome in your home.

Using Your Dehydrator

Using your dehydrator is the easy part. Wash your produce, slice it, place it on the trays, and set the thermostat! Though the owner’s manual may recommend higher temperatures for faster drying, optimal temperature for preserving nutrients is about 115 to 120 degrees.

Drying time depends on a variety of factors, including the thermostat temperature (higher temperatures dry faster), the thickness of the produce (generally ¼ inch thickness is recommended, thicker pieces dry more slowly), the type of produce (the juicier the fruit, the longer the dehydration time), and even the humidity level in your house! Set at a high temperature, your dehydrator may scorch foods if they are left in too long. But set at the recommended low temperature, you can usually leave the food in for days without worrying about scorching or nutrient loss. (At low temperatures, longer is better, because it is better for stored food to be as dry as possible.) Simply place the food in, turn on the machine, and then check it in a day or two, and your food will probably be dry.

To determine if your food is done, touch it with your fingers. Does it feel dry? The type of food determines the texture it will exhibit when dried. Strawberries may be spongy, apples leathery, pears sticky, and herbs crumbly. Check the book that comes with your dehydrator for drying time and ideal texture for individual food types.

Storing Dehydrated Produce

Dehydrated food stands the test of time longer than any other preservation method. It is not unheard-of to eat dried produce ten years after you dried it, or even more! This makes it the ultimate food to store for emergencies. But to get dried food to last, you must have a little knowledge about storage techniques.

First of all, you must dry the food adequately. Follow the directions in your dehydrator’s manual for judging the readiness of specific fruits and vegetables before removing them from your dehydrator. Pears, figs, dates, and raisins, for example, will remain slightly sticky even when thoroughly dried, but should not stick together in storage. Next, remember that the moment you turn off your dehydrator, the food inside begins to re-hydrate, acquiring moisture from the humidity in the air. For long-term storage, it should be removed and bagged immediately.

If long-term storage is not your goal and you plan to eat dried produce within a few days, there is no reason you cannot leave it sitting out in a bowl. It will not re-hydrate enough to spoil before it is consumed. You may be tempted, by force of habit, to put it in the refrigerator, but this may actually be the worst thing you can do, because of the high level of moisture circulating inside.

For long-term storage, dried produce can be placed in a glass jar or container, or even a cloth or paper bag. Glass containers should be as airtight as possible. Paper bags should have minimum air exposure, so press out air and fold the bag tightly around the food. Cloth and paper bags can be placed in tin, plastic, or cardboard containers to reduce air for more longevity. If using glass jars you have recently washed, make absolutely certain that they are completely dry before filling them with your dried foods!

Generally smaller containers are recommended for storage to reduce air exposure. If you keep dried food in a large container, you may have to open it several times to remove serving-sized portions, which increases the risk of spoilage.

Keep your containers of dehydrated food in a dry, cool, dark place, like your pantry. Inspect them occasionally to make certain that no pests or moisture can enter.

Recipes

There is no limit to the variety of tempting concoctions you can make in your dehydrator! Make fruit leathers with virtually any combination of fruits, and you are sure to enjoy them. Dried fruits, vegetables, and herbs add flavor to almost any dish. Dehydrators usually come with a book of recipes and suggestions. Here are some examples.

Cinnamon-Pear Leather

Ingredients:

• 4 large pears, cored, peeled, and pureed
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 pinch of nutmeg
• 1 pinch of cinnamon

Mix all ingredients together and spread over plastic wrap or nonstick dehydrator sheet to a thickness of 1/4 to 1/8 inch. Dehydrate between 115 and 120 degrees for 8-12 hours, or overnight. For an interesting variation, sprinkle with shredded coconut before drying.

Tomato Soup

Ingredients:

• 1 cup powdered dried tomato
• 1 cup powdered milk
• 7 cups water
• 1 tsp. dried parsley
• Salt and pepper to taste

In a blender, mix tomato powder, powdered milk, and half of the water. Add remaining water and heat in a pot on the stove. Add parsley, salt and pepper, and serve.

Dried Fruit Granola

Ingredients:

• 4 cups oats
• 1 cup sesame seeds
• 1 cup other chopped nuts, any kind
• ½ cup wheat germ
• 1 cup shredded coconut
• ½ cup honey
• ½ cup wheat flour
• 1 cup oil
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 cup raisins
• ½ cup dried peaches or apricots
• ½ cup dried apples
• ½ cup dried pineapple

Combine the oats, sesame seeds, other nuts, wheat germ, coconut, honey, wheat flour, oil, and salt in a bowl. Dehydrate at 120 degrees overnight (or turn up to 145 degrees and dehydrate 3 hours) until crunchy. Add the dried fruits and mix well. You can try substituting different types of dried fruits for variety!