How I dehydrated my vegetables
Summer's over and the output of my vegetable garden has ceased, save for a few late season tomatoes. It wasn't a great season for me, mainly because I don't know what I'm doing. My squash yield was only so-so, and the few watermelons and cantaloupes that appeared never made it past the ping pong ball stage. But I learned plenty of tips from new and old friends (and kind Boing Boing readers, too!), so maybe my fall/winter garden will be better.
My most successful crops were figs, cayenne peppers, and tomatoes. They came so quickly and in such abundance that we couldn't eat them fast enough. I gave a lot away to friends (except the figs, which are too delicious to share with anyone), and I dehydrated the rest using a Ronco food dehydrator. (The particular model I use is not available on Amazon any longer.)
It took several attempts to learn the best way to prepare different fruits for drying. Figs are tastier when dried whole instead of cut in half, and tomatoes are better halved rather than sliced into disks. I dried the peppers whole until they were crunchy and ground them up in a food processor.
I put the tomatoes and peppers into my eggs every morning and I cut the figs up and sprinkle them on my nightly bowl of blueberries and cream.
Next summer, I'm thinking of making a solar dehydrator (the "Appalachian Dehydrator") like the one Kelly and Erik of The Urban Homestead made.
the latest
latest episodes
I thought that figs are one of the foods that will dry on their own without rotting. But then, I live in the vast dehydrator known as Palm Springs.
Squash and Pumpkins are having problems these days because of the lack of bees in our environment. You will need to pollinate them yourself if no bees are around. These plants have both male and female blossoms. The female blossoms are the ones with the small fruit ball and the male blossoms are the larger of the two. The male blossoms usually bloom first followed a few days to a few weeks by the females. Pollen is mature if it readily comes off the stamen and onto your finger. Do not pick and use it until it is mature. There are usually several male flowers for every female flower. There should be a mature male or two ready to pollinate whenever a female matures. Use the male blossom to pollinate the female. Voila!
Do you dry them on the tree, Antinous?
No. I just find that fresh figs sitting around the house turn into dried figs, but they never rot.
Mark,
How did the tobacco come out?
On what magical plane of existence do you reside, where people sprinkle dried figs on a nightly feast of blueberries and cream?! I only ask because I would like to ask if this happy fig sparkle land is accepting immigration applications.
Mark, do you plan to eat that stuff?
Falcon_Seven@7: Yes, and if you had read the post, you'd have seen where I wrote "I put the tomatoes and peppers into my eggs every morning and I cut the figs up and sprinkle them on my nightly bowl of blueberries and cream."
It's scary for some people to eat food they've grown and processed themselves, but once you get past the fact that it doesn't come in a box from Kraft, you'll find it's delicious.
Plant borage with your veggies to attract pollinators.
I find simply using a big box fan and a series of furnace screens will cover all of my drying needs from meat to herbs to etc.
You may consider trying the Tube for a video of Good Eats Urban Preservation II, or Herbal Preservation, two classic episodes that demonstrate the same technique.
Depending on your future bounties, Urban Preservation I (dealing with jams) may be of interest too, as well as the various pickling episodes which I'm too out of comment momentum to locate the name of.
My husband built 2 of the Solar food dehydrator from the book "The Solar Food Dryer" by Eben Fodor. The design is a bit more compact than the one you link to.
I do wish I could make use of a solar dehydrator, but we live far enough north that the season is barely long enough to grow things in, and by the time things are all in, I suspect it would be too cool to get much solar heat.
Easily half of my tomatoes are still green on the vines, and it won't be long before we have to choose between blanketing them every night and just picking the remaining green ones...
The juxtaposition of the Kingston Trio and your nightly bowl of blueberries and cream, makes me feel we may make it through this thing after all.
Mark, try roasting and freezing some of your tomatoes next time. This is especially useful if you've grown the wetter varieties of heirloom tomatoes.
And yes, that means I've got an Instructable up on the subject. ;)
http://www.instructables.com/id/Roasted-Tomatoes/
(More fun uses for roasted tomatoes linked in step 3.)
I'm building and planting this container vegetable garden:
http://www.veggiegrower.net/3.html
Mark, I was just asking because your results look nothing like this depiction. I'm just concerned that you might be doing something incorrectly and that it could have dire consequences since your results differ so drastically from the manufacturer's depiction.
Mark, that stuff looks delicious. Seriously. Nice crop, despite what you say. I commend your ability to toil in the soil and produce your own food! I do not have the patience for it and will thus be left to dine on 1,000-year-old Twinkies after the Peak Oil-pocalypse.
@16: You're either brain-damaged, or one of the most subtle trolls I've ever seen.
@18: I know, right?
Falcon Seven, unless your (for example) fig is moldy or rotten (which will be evident) or has been stolen and switched for something that is not a fig, then it is still a fig and edible. I'm sure you can produce food at home that resembles the picture you linked, but not everyone is comfortable adding that much sulphur to their food.
Personally, it's the food that does come in a box from Kraft that I find scary. Homegrown is the way to go.
Mark, another option for the tomato glut is smoking. My husband figured out that tomatoes smoked with apple wood chips are wildly, insanely delicious. And poblano peppers processed into ancho peppers by this method aren't too shabby either. I put them together in a cream sauce for pasta that was mind blowing.
I wrote about the process here:
http://livingthefrugallife.blogspot.com/2008/09/more-on-apple-smoked-cherry-tomatoes.html
But I also admire the dehydrator discussed on homegrown evolution. And I completely understand your unwillingness to give away any figs. It's one of the very few fruits I miss now that I'm in zone 6. Cherries will be my consolation.
Nice to meet someone else that loves tomatoes and peppers on their eggs. I like to take equal parts Jalapenos and Habaneros, chop them fine in a food processor, add half apple cider vinager and water to the level of the peppers in a pot with a little salt. Cook them just long enough for the peppers to start getting a little soft - then pour it into jars. When sealed - they last almost forever and they taste delicious with salsa on your eggs. If Habaneros are too hot, substitute serrano peppers.
After years of eating this extremely hot mixture, I've found the perfect topping for a portion of eggs. 1 tsp of the pepper mixture, 1 tsp hot salsa, 2-3 good dashes of Tobasco, and 1 med drop of Daves Insanity Sauce. Capsaicin and peppers in general are very good for you. They or course increase circulation, are antioxidants. and anti inflammatory. and have a lot of cardiovascular benefits.
From World's Healthiest Foods: Red chili peppers, have been shown to reduce blood cholesterol, triglyceride levels, and platelet aggregation, while increasing the body's ability to dissolve fibrin, a substance integral to the formation of blood clots. Cultures where hot pepper is used liberally have a much lower rate of heart attack, stroke and pulmonary embolism.
Wow Mark, those are some colorful figs. Calmyrna? or...?
We use our dried brown figs here in place of raisins for rice pudding, oatmeal, muffins, etc. Sometimes they need to be chopped up smaller so kids (read: mine, with wobbly teeth) will eat them. Cooking or baking them in something softens them up enough that most picky eaters won't balk.
A bonus with figs: nutrition. Two dried figs contain 49.6 IU of Vitamin A, 266 mg potassium, 53.8 mg calcium (Laurel's Kitchen p 469, ISBN 0-89815-166-X). (Any food combiners out there to tell us what we can eat with dried figs to get the most good out of them? Citrus maybe?)
Figs are heavy feeders and drinkers. If you plan on raising one, best bet is to plant it near a leaky septic tank or septic field, or next to a large compost pile. Don't worry about the germs unless you're picking figs off the ground, the plant itself doesn't mobilize pathogens. And if your fig tree gets too tall to harvest with a ladder, try spreading a big clean tarp under the side you're working and shake the branches. The ripe ones'll kersplat... er, ah, land on the tarp within easy reach.
Fortunately we are in a dry enough climate (saskatchewan) to just use the sun. I do dry a few tomatoes, though I can most of them.
Mostly I dry brassica greens, which do not freeze or can well. It works fabulously - you can crunch a handful into a soup, or I have even made spanakopita from reconstituted broccoli leaves. I usually blanch them a bit before setting them out to dry.
Likewise zuchinni dry very easily into veggie chips that you can use just like potato chips, though with all this stuff it helps to keep them sealed in with a little bag of silica gel to counter humidity.
And regarding drying on trees, I have heard that some fruit trees don't produce well the next year if they are not picked.
12: I am in the exact same situation with my tomatoes. I've got some late bloomers on my bell pepper plant too. I wish the season were longer up here.
I'm so glad you post stuff like this Mark - this is the first year I've had a garden by myself, and while I'm hardly skilled, I've gotten pretty obsessed with it. So, I love reading about this stuff!
Thanks for all the good ideas here, everyone. I want to try all of them. The fun thing about making your own food is that it never gets boring. There's always something new to try.
the best food is grown or got by you and prepared by someone who loves you.
A few tips:
There's increasing controversy over plastic food containers. My mother always recycled glass jars and it's a habit I can't break. If you don't have glass jars (from peanut butter, almond butter, tahini, spaghetti sauce, applesauce, etc), you can buy Mason jars at many hardware stores or order online. They last forever and you don't have to replace the lids often (that only happens when dealing with liquids and heating during canning). I use them for my dried food, home-made sauerkraut, Rejuvelac, Kombucha, water kefir, herbal teas, soups, whatever.
Brown glass jars are best if you are keeping food on a counter. I recycle jars from a variety of green powders or other concoctions from the local health food store. You can buy brown glass jars too.
Finally, for the hard-core foodie, there's http://www.fantes.com/jars.html. I saw some at Cost Plus in the Grove this summer, but they change products all the time. (FYI: I don't make any money promoting any of the products I'm mentioning here.)
The point is you want air-tight containers but not the questionable gases emitting from plastic, even so-called non-glass "food safe" containers.
NEXT: SOAK your fruit before eating and they will be easier to digest and very tasty. Drink the fluid too. Some soak their figs overnight for breakfast. That will help your system move in the morning!
(I am pea green with envy you grew so many figs. How I yearn for a fig tree. Try growing mulberries! They are soooo expensive and rare, but if you can grow figs, you should be able to grow mulberries in LA!)
Soak your tomatoes when starting to cut up a salad and add right before serving.
NEXT: Slice tomatoes and any other fruit or veggies using a mandoline or inexpensive slicer and dry. They will be paper thin, translucent and literally melt in your mouth.
Dehydrating fruit and veggies brings out their natural sugar, and the thinner, the better!
I usually air dry fresh herbs. Instead of throwing out excess veggies, whether green leafy or solid like beets or other root veggies, slice and throw into the dehydrator! When you sprinkle and stir the dried leaves (which crumble easily) or sliced veggies over cooked veggies, rice, soup, whatever for extra nutrition and taste, they will absorb some of the liquid in the cooked food and plump up a bit.
NEXT: dried veggies and fruit are the best snacks/meals when fresh food is not convenient. Consume when running errands whether driving, bus, biking, walking or at the movies, shopping, school or work (but ONLY if you don't have access to fresh fruit/veggies) or whenever out and about.
Sooo much healthier than ANY "energy" bar or bag of dried fruit and nuts, using questionable ingredients.
BUT drink fluid or soak, because dried fruit/veggies can cause digestive distress or stick to teeth if not enough fluid to accompany them. Usually people don't advocate fluids when eating, due to diluting digestive juices, but these foods normally are filled with liquid (even fresh parsley can be juiced), so your body needs something. Or combine with other non-dried foods, as Mark suggests.
There's tons you can do once you get into dehydrating, from making your own crackers, cookies, breads, tortillas and more, all without any animal or cooked products. Raw foodies share many recipes online and in books. If you've seen these products at stores like Whole Foods, you'll note they are VERY expensive. But you can set aside an evening and prepare batches of food to last for weeks. It's VERY easy and lots of fun!
But no chemicals and no high temps results in better health.
Raw foodists dehydrate their fruit and veggies using lower temp units. Yes, it takes longer, but the vital vitamins, minerals and enzymes are preserved.
Previously we've been limited to the Excalibur. Now there's a more affordable unit with better features being sold by a pal of mine. Raw chef, Bryan Au, rawinten.com, author of "Raw in Ten Minutes" (recommended by Oprah, if that matters to any of you). You need to scroll down his home page, rawinten.com, to see the unit.
From his site and emails to me:
NEW SUPER COOL Good4U 10 Tray Dehydrator, is far more affordable than the Excalibur. It is quieter, more compact, 500 watts and more efficient with better aeration than the Excalibur.
--85 to 140 Degrees.
--6 tray, with 6.25 square feet of drying area, 8.5" H x 13.5"W x 18.5" D for $125.
--10 tray, 10.50 square feet of drying area, 8.5" H x 13.5"W x 13.5" D for $150.
--Includes mesh sheets AND teflex sheets (!).
--Prices include tax/shipping/handling. Shipping Weight: 6 trays, 14 lbs or 10 trays, 17 lbs.
--10 Year Warranty
--Recipe book
--You can see through the clear trays, which form the enclosure, so no door to carefully align. Eliminates the need to remove the whole door to check or remove one tray, which improves dehydration efficiency and aeration.
As someone who routinely dries fruit and veggies, and grows my own organic sprouts in my apt kitchen, your food looks FAB! I have no idea why anyone would question your results. Check out the sun dried fruit at the Santa Monica farmer's market near the beach to see trays and trays of dried fruit. And check out the prices!
You've saved hundreds of dollars by both growing and drying your fruit. The downside of not growing fruit makes dehydrating extremely expensive
It's an amazing thing to me that people question people growing and processing their own food, but NEVER question what they eat out of a box, can, frozen, bag or at any restaurant. ANY restaurant. Have we really removed ourselves from our own instincts and nature so quickly?
We have soooo much info literally at our fingertips due to the net. Drying our own fruit and veggies, growing organic sprouts on a kitchen counter and pickling/fermenting (but NOT heating during the process) are some of the healthiest and cheapest ways of surviving! But no, people buy into what the large agri-businesses tell us, the danger of providing our own food. The danger is they don't want us to know how to survive on our own and thus turn against them.
It's never been more important to know how to "do it yourself" if we are to survive the increasingly difficult financial times with the lack of safety and nutritional oversight re our food, You can stretch your food dollars and discover amazingly tasty healthy food YOU produce! Whatta concept!
As Mark stated, they make great gifts. He gave away fresh food, but how about trading dried food too or gifts? Read Barbara Kingsolver's year of living off local, fresh produce in "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle." As a raw foodie, I don't agree with her take on animal products, but you can't argue with the beauty and wisdom of what she experienced and shared with her readers. However, legal restrictions weigh against some of these policies, so sometimes it's best to keep it underground. Read "The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved" by Sandor Ellix Katz for more ideas and info.
What a great idea!
I have a cherry tomato plant on the back porch, and it is crazy. It makes way too many tomatoes. It gets so big the pot tips over, and I have to tether the whole thing to the porch rail. This year it got so big it bent one of the plastic support rods.
It's got a lot of green tomatoes on it, but it's starting to get cold. Soon I'm going to take them all off and put them in a bag to ripen. I'll definitely consider drying them out.
When I was a kid we dried apples every year by slicing them and laying them out on huge screens with a thin white curtain covering them. The sun and wind do all the work. We dried beans and peppers on long strings hung on poles. They looked like beaded curtains. We canned or froze everything else. We ate fried apple pies and leather britches during the winter. I get a craving for them towards Christmas.
Hey Mark, you do know figs and tomatoes (and squash) are FRUIT?? Your post states dehydrating vegetables. But ALL seed-bearing produce are fruit. That includes cucumbers, avocadoes, tomatoes, squash, eggplant, etc. And Halloween pumpkins! [They are part of the squash family.] We call the more bitter, bland fruit veggies cos we put them into salads and/or cook them. We only think of fruit as being sweet and eaten raw. LOL!
And Apreche, if you ever get into pickling/fermenting, use your unripe green tomatoes! Ripe tomatoes, green or red, don't pickle/ferment.
Read Sandor's "Wild Fermentation." SO much fun and so easy to do! I ONLY wish I could grow fresh produce, whether fruit and/or veggies.
Good health to everyone! And the more you participate in the growing and preparation of your food, and the more you eat seasonally and locally, the better your health. L'chaim!
Strumpet Windsock - do you mind if I ask how far North in Saskatchewan you live? Do you use a dryer something like the one in the link?
I'm in Edmonton, where we seem to be getting cool damp Autumns, so sun I have my doubts about sun drying things. But maybe I'm just misunderestimating the effectiveness of these solar driers.
I'm in Saskatoon. I suspect you'd be a bit more humid there being closer to the bush.
I usually just wait for a dry day (like the ones we have had up until today). On the odd occasion it doesn't quite get there I just put it in the oven on low for a bit; I'm sure there are easy solar options. All you'd need is a sealed unit and a chamber that would raise temperature but still allow airflow.
Here's a really good locally-designed oven you might be able to modify; they usually have working versions at the Ness Creek festival every year:
http://www.solarfreedominternational.com/7.html
And like I said, I always blanch leafy greens and slice stems before drying, and for storage I use a bag of silica gel, which helps particularly with stuff that might want to rehydrate (like zuchinni or apples).
The cheapest source for silica gel I know is at superstore, where they sell it in a big container as cat litter. You can also dehydrate the gel again by putting it in an oven or microwave.
Fortunately we both have dry winters (I hang my laundry in the basement during the winter, and have never had humidity problems - it all gets sucked into the air), so rehydrating shouldn't really be a problem like it might be in a place like Winnipeg.
But it also helps to know what storage method is best for what produce; as I said, most stuff I can, roots I pack in sand, and fresh apples and squash keep through the winter in cold storage. I only dry herbs, brassica greens and some tomatoes and summer squash.
"nightly bowl of blueberries and cream"
Do you put on the Lord Fauntleroy outfit when you mow that bad boy down?
;P
Cool. I just got a Nesco dehydrator a couple weeks ago and now it's an essential part of my life. I was going to build one too, but I live in a nasty, damp humid city (Vancouver), and my homemade one with heat only was a total failure. It needed the fan, airflow design and 500w heater of the commercial unit to work without taking forever (or growing mold).
I can't grow anything (apartment dweller) but I can buy local vegetables in bulk when they're cheap, and dry them.
My daily lunch these days is assorted dried veg, dried cooked dry beans (heh) with spices, and instant rice (yeah... but I haven't got around to trying to make my own dried cooked rice yet). Meat is on the menu soon but I'm a little apprehensive about how long it can keep out of the fridge.
Anyways, I just add boiling water, wait 10min... eat up! The meal is exceedingly cheap and healthy compared to pre-made lunch options, and no need to worry about making/keeping leftovers from dinner! I love it!
#29, Jamie Sue:
This is totally the best way to do it. I once walked into a friend's kitchen to see 1000+ bright red peppers strung like christmas lights around the room- it was beautiful.
It seems a bit odd to use a (power-consuming) dehydrating machine to accomplish this when it's so easy to do it without. Figs are also most delicious when semi-dried (and they'll keep for ages like this).