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Thursday, Oct. 22, 2009

You can dry foods yourself

Preserving produce doesn’t have to happen over a hot range or by finding more room in the freezer. It can be as simple as slicing it, laying the slices in a dehydrator and storing the dried pieces.

Recently I received a phone call from someone who wanted to make the wonderful apples last longer this year. Drying them at home is a great solution. You can dry those great tasting apples or other fruits and vegetables so you can enjoy them later in the year.

Some of the advantages to drying include that it is inexpensive, having little cost other than a little electricity if you use a dehydrator and packaging to store it; and the filled packages can sit out at room temperature.

Dried food doesn’t have to be refrigerated because the moisture that would cause it to spoil has been evaporated.

Some great foods to dry are apples, figs and pineapple.

It is too humid in the Southeast to dry foods outside. In other parts of the country, such as California, people can lay food out on a tray and place it in the sun.

Fruits are one of the easiest types of produce to dry. Unlike vegetables, which usually require blanching before they can be dried, fruits can be sliced and placed on a dehydrator shelf.

Some fruits don’t work, like kiwi. The slices end up shrinking so much that it basically becomes a small amount of seeds.

To dry an apple or another fruit, follow these steps:

1. Choose good quality produce. If it’s moldy, mushy or browning, throw it out.

2. Wash the fruit, and slice it evenly. The more even the width and sizes, the more even drying will be.

3. Place it on a tray in an electric dehydrator. If your oven can be programmed for low temperatures, you can use it. Set the dehydrator’s temperature at 140 degrees. Food dried at lower temperatures might never fully dry. At higher temperatures, it dries faster on the outside becoming hard but leaving the inside moist and likely to rot.

4. Wait a few hours and keep a close eye on the slices as they get nearer to the end of drying. Food close to being done will dry faster at the end than at the beginning.

5. Seal the finished pieces in freezer-weight bags or in plastic storage boxes.

Follow the same steps with vegetables, except blanch them first. Blanching time depends on the vegetable. The only vegetables that don’t have to be blanched are onions, okra and peppers (all types).

The use of a pretreatment on light colored fruits will help prevent rapid browning.

Home-dried fruits and vegetables can be a healthier solution for people who are worried about preservatives, extra sugar or, in some cases, added oils. By drying your own fruits especially apples and pineapples you can leave the sugar off. Oftentimes these fruits will have a sugar coating on them when they are commercially prepared.

A dried apple has the same amount of sugar that a whole fresh apple would have. It just has a smaller volume because all the water has been removed from the fresh apple.

Dried fruit can be mixed with nuts for a trail mix or eaten alone. Dried vegetables make a good starter for soup mix.

Drying tends to be popular with people who hike, backpack or kayak. A real advantage is the condensed volume, lighter weight and small storage space.

Dried fruits and vegetables can be reconstituted. Once they have been reconstituted they should be treated like fresh fruit and vegetables.

To reconstitute dried fruits or vegetables, add water and soak until the desired volume is restored. Do not over-soak the food. Over-soaking produces loss of flavor and a mushy, water-logged texture.

For soups and stews, add the dehydrated vegetables without rehydrating them. They will rehydrate as the soup or stew cooks.

Jan Baggarly is Bibb County Extension coordinator with the University of Georgia Cooperative Extension working in the field of family and consumer sciences. She may be contacted at 751-6338.