Dilly Dust!!! What's that?

Good morning Y'all!!!     Sorry I haven't been around much, but I haven't much to share.     Maybe I've had more to share than I realized after sharing what I'm getting ready to share with y'all.     I've gotten out my food dehydrator and started using it here lately.    It's fun, so I thought I would share that with y'all.    This post first appeared on my face book page and I thought it might be fun to share it here too.   When I share stuff like this on my fb page, I call it "2 minutes cooking with me" or something like like that.      I need to work a name out for good and call it that every time.     hahaha

I think it's time for another 2 or 5 minute "in the kitchen" with me today.      Have you every heard of "dilly dust"?      Don't feel bad, I hadn't either, until I made it!!      Yes, that's right, I made dilly dust. Before I tell you how to make it, you might be saying, "why would I" want to make it?         Well, I like potato chips, but I don't buy them anymore.      I make my 5-6 minute microwave potato chips that are DIVINE!!!         Now, think "dilly dust".      You got it, dilly dust on my potato chips, or sprinkled on deviled eggs, or sprinkled over a salad, or a taco plate and the imagination gets lost out in left field thinking of all the applications of my "dilly dust".       Ok, I got you hooked and you want to know how to make it, now that you know why to make it.  hahaha

I bought a cheap jar of dill pickles.      I drained them and washed them really well.       Trying to get as much vinegar and salt off them as possible.       I bought a small snackmaster dehydrator back in 1994.      Yes, waaaaaaaaay back then.     hahaha      I thought it was time to get it out again and use it. When you dehydrate food, it amps up the flavors with the finished product. that's why I washed the vinegar and salt from the pickles.      I don't care about the vinegar, but the salt is the main reason I rinsed them.       If salt isn't an issue for you, then don't even do it.     Let the pickle chips drain good and then start filling your trays with the pickle chips.      You can also take big whole dill pickles and a mandolin and slice then yourself.     That's actually what I did the first small batch I made.       For this batch, I got 2 trays crammed full of dill pickle slices.      I then sliced an organic lemon as thin as I could and got tray of lemon slices, so I can make lemon dust and then I had 2 organic roma tomatoes and I cut those up on the 4th tray.     So I have it full and going right now.      It will run all day and I'll check it and turn it off before bed time.      Some may be done by then, all of it could be, but I doubt it.      I'll unplug it tonight and plug it back up on Monday morning to finish.     (just to let know, they was done before 7:00pm, yay)

I'll store them in Ball jars with desiccant packets to keep any moisture down.      Then, when I want "dilly powder", "lemon powder" or "lime powder", I'll use my coffee grinder dedicated to spices to make my powder to use as a seasoning on our potato chips or popcorn.    YUM!!!    And BAM, just like that you have "dilly powder".

Got a few pictures of the process and will share more next week when I get these done and may grind a little and see if I can get a picture of that too. I sure hope you enjoyed this 2 or 5 minute "in the kitchen" with me today. hugs and be blessed y'all, patty

***********It's about 6:40 pm and thought I would update y'all on the dilly dust, lemon dust, and dried roma tomatoes saga.      All is good and all is dry.     I even have "dilly dust" made right now!!! take a look.      It's funny, a 32 oz jar of dill pickles condensed down to about 2 tablespoons of "dilly dust".      It's soooo good too.      I can't wait to make some homemade microwave potato chips and sprinkle it on them!!

This is the pictures of the process.

So, this was my pickles washed in my strainer and draining.     I just started placing them on the trays.     I got 2 trays crammed jammed full of pickles.

This is the organic lemon that I sliced myself with my chef knife.     I tried to make as uniformly thin slices as I possibly could and it filled this try up.    Yay!!!

For this one, I was just trying to show how thinly I had sliced the lemons.      In my last experimental session I had sliced organic limes and dried them, and wow, did they ever smell decadent, and the lemons do too.     I am anxious to get these ground up into "Lemon Dust"!!!!      The "Lime Dust" smells like the most wonderful lime dessert you have ever tasted!!!!!      I can't wait to dehydrate more citrus fruits.

This was the 2 organic roma tomatoes sliced.      These weren't the best quality and not the best looking, but WOW, I'm telling you they were fantastic with my supper!!!!    Like I said earlier, when you dehydrate food, it really amplifies the flavors soooooo much and these were like eating candy, almost, only better for you.

This is what the 2 dried trays of pickle slices looked like.     Someone said they wanted to try this for a keto snack.     My suggestion would be to not let them go this long and use a better quality pickle.    This was the cheapest 32 oz jar of pickles in the store.    I will try some bread and butter pickles and also sweet pickles at some point in time.    But you cans see how they really shrank up, which is exactly what I expected.

This is the 2 trays put on one tray in a pile.    Not a lot for sure.    hahaha

This is the finished product!!!!!      2 tablespoons of "Dilly Dust"!!!!!      This is some spectacular flavoring!!!!     I will be watching for pickles of all kinds on sale now, for sure!!!!!      The next time I do this and take pictures, I will be sure and get a shot of my coffee grinder that is dedicated to my seasonings and spices.     It comes apart easily to wash and get cleaned up, so if I ever wanted to grind coffee with it, I could and I would.   If you don't have a coffee grinder, just watch for them to go on sale.     I think I got mine at CVS or Walgreen's for about $6 or $7 a few years ago.     So, just keep an eye out and you can find one somewhere for a good price.

Something else I wanted to share y'all is this.    If you notice on my dehydrator trays, you'll see something on top of it with a smaller mesh size.     That is crafting canvas.     When I unboxed my dehydrator, after many years of being dormant, one of my trays was busted.    The bottom had  place where some of it broken out and wouldn't, of course, hold anything that I wanted to dehydrate.     My friend and I were at the Goodwill store and the was a brand new pkg of plastic canvas, 14 x 12 sheets, I think that's the size.     There were 12 sheets in and I snatched that up quicker than a duck on a June bug!!!!   hahahaha     I took the fruit leather tray that came with my dehydrator and traced the outside of it and the inside hole on all 12 layers of plastic canvas.     And these work like a dream!!!!!      They are non stick and they work wonderfully on the one that has a big hold in bottom of it.    Plus, if I get another round dehydrator, I'll be able to use these in it also.     So be on the lookout for cheap plastic canvas too, to make dehydrating easier for you in the future.

Here back, I dehydrated some celery and carrots.     If I get an abundance of some particular veggie or fruit, that's what I will do to prevent waste.      It's fun and it saves money.      The celery and carrots will be wonderful in soup.     I did par-boil them for about 5 minutes to maintain the color after they are dehydrated.    After removing from boiling water, plunge them into an ice water bath to prevent further cooking and then they are ready to dehydrate.     You can par-boil some of your veggies and some don't have to be par-boiled.     Just do a google search and if you find any kind of a chart, print it out and you'll be ready to start doing some dehydrating too.     Also, watch for sale on dehydrators.  I would not suggest you get one at Goodwill or the thrift store, just because this is something that really is hard to keep all the parts cleaned and you won't know how the previous owner used it or cleaned it.     Just to be on the safe side, watch for them on sale in your favorite stores or online.     If you have an Aldi, you may find one there this Spring or Summer.     

Anyway, I hope this has given you an idea of some of the fun things that you can do with excess food and a dehydrator.     The imagination just runs wild and it's an exciting time.     You can also waych for canned foods on sale and dehydrate that too!!!      Watch for fruits, such as strawberries, and any of the berries, and bananas, coconut, mango, and my mind is racing out of my skull.    hahaha      The one thing you want to watch out for is foods high in oils.    DO NOT try to dehydrate something like an avocado.      You can also google some of the things that might not be best suited for dehydrating.  Just do some research before you get started and you will have success.      If you have any questions, do not hesitate to leave me a question and I'll get back to you with an answer.  

I had another batch of celery that I was gonna dehydrate, but I decided to make some celery soup.   It was delicious.     If you decide to make to celery soup, you want to "de-string" the celery as well as you possibly can.     I have a thing about stringy celery.   hahaha      But, if you want to, just make sure to cut your celery in very short pieces.      I cut mine in about 2 inch pieces and that was my mistake and where all the visible strings came from!!!    So, don't do as I did, cut your pieces really short.    Season it with whatever spices  and seasonings you wish.      I cooked mine in the electric pressure cooker.     It cooks it quickly and easily.  

This is what my celery soup looked like once I got all the celery strings out of it.   hahahaha      I just could not go the stringiness in it after I used my stick blender, so I strained it thru a small strainer.    After I got it strained real good, I put some chopped ham in it and it was really good!!

This a bowl of the celery soup and a piece of bread stick toast with garlic powder on it.    We like it crunchy and well toasted.     This was a really yummy and hearty soup and well worth sacrificing one whole celery bunch to make.     The garlic toast was a cheesy bread stick that I got at Kroger and I split it down the middle, put a little bit of real butter on on it and sprinkled on some garlic powder and popped it in the toaster oven.     We really enjoyed this.    I didn't really have a recipe.     Just wash and cut one whole bunch of celery, a couple of small potatoes, an onion finely diced, some bell pepper and just saute all of this in the electric pressure cooker for 20 or 30 minutes till it starts smelling really good and then stop the saute and turn it back on to pressure cook, and add 4 or 5 cups of chicken bone broth, for about 15 minutes and let it natural release and then use your stick blender, submersion blender as some call it, and blend it till it's smooth.     If you find it a little thin, just turn the saute back on and let it cook down to the thickness you like.      You can also add salt and pepper and other seasonings to your taste. 

Well, I hope you have enjoyed your time in the kitchen with me today.   I hope to bring more sun stuff like this in the future.     If you have something that I just have to try, please leave me a message.     

I hope you will take the time sometime today to thank God for all the necessities He has provided for us to live healthy and productive lives.      It is by Him and for Him that we live anyway.     So, I thank God today for the rich and bountiful blessing He has provided for me, not because I deserve them, but because of His great love for me and you!!      Yes, let me just tell you that God loves you too.     I can honestly tell you that He doesn't sin  and He can't look upon sin.      That is why God provided Jesus Christ as the ONLY way to be in right relationship with Him!      When we have accepted Christ as Lord and Savior of our lives, then we can be in full relationship with Him.     That is praise worthy today y'all!!!!    

I pray you have a blessed rest of the day and tell someone you know that Jesus loves them.     Tell someone about what you saw here today too.     See you right back sometime in the near future.    Just know that God loves you and so do I.    hugs and love and be blessed today, patty