Good afternoon my friends!!! I hope that you all are having a most glorious day, Happy Easter!!!!! The tomb is empty this morning and Christ has Risen indeed!!!!!!! That is some of the best news this world has ever gotten!!! The world we live in is filled with evil and we all know it. Our only hope is the Hope that we have in Christ. Scripture tells us just how evil and wicked this world will get and it's gotten there pretty quickly. But scripture also tells us that Christ has overcome the world!!! So if you know Christ as you perconal Lord and Savior, you are an overcomer through Him. Praise His Holy Name!!!!! Again, Happy Easter!!!!! Thank God today for this blessing!!!
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I have compiled several of my dehydrating projects and am sharing them here, all in one long post. Well, a lot of them anyway. It may not be all, because I've done an awful lot of dehydrating and taken many many pictures. Probably way to many, but now you get to see some of them. hahahaha also when I was putting up the pictures, a lot of them got in the wrong order, but I know y'all can figure them out. I am really sorry about that, I tried to fix, but the more I tried, the worse it got, so I just left them alone. again, I'm sorry about that.
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Since I had some produce to put on the dehydrator, I thought I would share how I do it for us. There is 6 serrano peppers on the left side of my dehydrator tray. I split each one down the middle and then split them in half, making 4 pieces. I know when I reach for my serrano pepper jar that 4 pieces make 1 pepper. when I do my shishito peppers, I will just split them down the middle and that's it. 2 pieces will make 1 pepper. They are usually smaller and shorter than my serranos. When I do my fresno peppers, I'll split them down the middle and then split each half down the middle again. They don't get as long as the serranos, but they do get fatter. Again, 4 pieces will equal 1 pepper. It's just an easy way for me to know, without really having to think about it, how many pieces I need when I'm going to be using them. If I can work out a system like this for any of my dehydrated goods, I do. It makes it easier to use. It makes it easier to powder. I can have a good visual of how much 4 pieces of my pepper will make when powdered. Just work on your own system of use and write on your jars any calculations you come up with. Sometimes, my jars look like math projects that went awry. hahaha Just a word of caution, when working with HOT peppers, do wear a glove on the hand handling the cut peppers. If you don't, you will wish you had. hahaha Especially if you rub your eye a week later. hahahaha
This is what I took off my dehydrator, just before laundry took over the house. (Clean clothes are over-rated, but necessary once in a while and my dehydrator lives on my washer. hahaha) The tomato is in a 10 oz jar. It was a big fist sized tomato and I had to cut a couple spots out of it. It dehydrated down to about 2 1/2 or 3 tablespoons, diced. The mixed veggies was a can of Allens 6.6 lb of mixed veggies. Once I poured the liquid off and rinsed, there was 4.6 lbs left. Once dehydrated they weigh in at 0.05.8 lbs. They are in a 16 oz vlasic pickle jar and it's not full at all. I just thought this would be a good visual. About the Allen's mixed veg, my Momma got them and asked me if I would want to dehydrate them. I had never gotten a BIG can like this. From my experience with them, I personally, would not recommend them. The picture shows more color than they have in real life. Everything is in shades of dark green and grays in real life. They are not appetizing or appealing at all. But, this is just my experience. I dehydrated @ 120* for 38 hours. They were ready to be taken off last night when I went to bed. I didn't feel like getting them off and it was easier to just let it run and it assured me that everything was 100% dry. Now, they are conditioning. I don't think I'm gonna give these to my Momma. I want everything I give to her to be perfect, and these are far from it. But it is a good visual as to how thinks shrink and that is to be expected. So, I cry for the rest of the day till my washer is unused.
We went to an amish store on Wednesday and I got a couple boxes of frozen rhubarb. 3 lbs worth. I get it at least once a year. Since it's frozen, I let it thaw in the fridge a couple days and then pressed as much liquid from it as possible. I wish I had taken a pic of the before, but just didn't think about it. 3 lbs went down to 3 oz. But it makes a wonderful powder to use in just about anything. Then I had some mandarins in the fridge that needed to be used. I had already peeled about a lb and a half so I finished filling my dehydrator with them on the top rack. I didn't weigh them before or after. I put some back on just now, because they weren't completely dry in the center. These will be turned into powder and put into something "chocolate" for my hubby. Some of the mandarins are darker than others because of the sugar content in them. Some were sweeter than others. I done these at the same time on 125* and set the machine for 48 hours and forgot about it. When the other mandarins get done, that jar will be full.
more dehydrating projects. BOTTOM pic: jar 1 has mixed veggies from where I cleaned out some of my boxes that I keep prepped veg in. Jar 2 has 3 sliced yellow squash. Jar 3 has green onion blades from my freebie roots that I planted from a batch of green onions. Trying to fill that jar. Jar 4 has 2 zucchini. TOP pic: jar 1 has pea hulls. I'll have more to put in that this afternoon, when I pick peas. Once dehydrated, I'll grind the pea hulls and add it to green powder. Jar 2 has cherry tomatoes. Before I get more at the store, I'll dehydrate what I already have, so nothing goes to waste. Good snacking. Jar 3 is leek greens from the roots of some leeks I purchased and planted the roots. Trying to get that little jar filled too. Sticking to my motto "something is better than nothing". do a little and it adds up. (pictures got mixed up when I uploaded them)
building my stash from unused veggies I prepped earlier in the week. plus, some zucchini and yellow squash for the purpose of dehydrating. I don't do anything on large scale. I mostly salvage what I have in the fridge on a weekly basis. but, it all adds up. "something is better than nothing". pic 1: each jar of squash has 6 in them. I want to get some more dehydrated. maybe mine will kick in and start giving me some to dehydrate. the jar of pepper strips was started last month. and it's just about full. pic 2: that small jar is of my serrano peppers. I split them length ways and then cut them in half, making 4 pieces per pepper. I know it takes 4 pieces to = 1 pepper. the next jar is tomatoes, I filled it up with what I took off this morning and the last jar is mixed veg. I added about a half inch of diced celery. all these little kibbles and bits add up to meals in the future. yay!!
russet potatoes for dehydrating: peeled and sliced in 1/2 inch slabs, then made 1/2 inch sticks and then made 1/2 inch dice (not all are the same length, some a little longer but if thickness of slices and width of sticks are good, the length can be a little off). put in bowl of cold water as I was peeling slicing and dicing. drained water 3 times and refilled with cold water each time. total rinse time was about 45 mins. while rinsing got my boiling pot ready and put potatoes in, let it come back to full rolling boil, started timer set at 5 mins. immediately lifted from boiling pot and put in bowl with ice water. let sit till most of ice is melted. pour off that water and put more cold water over and let potatoes cool completely. I gently stirred them in my strainer so the cold water would reach them all. drain well and put on dehydrator and don't worry about time. I dehydrated at 120F till they were rock hard. plenty of rinsing before blanching washed off a ton of starch. each time the water was almost cream colored just from the starch being washed off. I am thoroughly convinced that plenty of rinsing and blanching for the right amt of time, especially with the starchier potatoes will prevent blackened potato slices. I have another batch of potatoes to get done and I will do them the same exact way. I also cut off any noticeable black spots on the potatoes as I'm peeling them. I think that helps with some of the discoloration too. hope this helps anyone that's having issues.
I was working on some lunch prep just a few minutes ago and while I was, my mind is always pre-occupied with what I'm going to dehydrate next. I was splitting some cherry tomatoes in half. and as I was thinking about what I was doing, I got my phone and a took a pic. when I slice cherry tomatoes, sometimes I'm not paying attention and just want to get the job done. but over the last couple of years I have figured out how to slice them for them to dehydrate a little quicker. notice the picture. #1 is the tomato and you see the stem end. #2 is the tomato sliced from the stem end to the bloom end, north to south. #3 is the tomato sliced around the circumference of the tomato, east to west. #3, east to west will dehydrate quicker because all the moisture and seeds in the tomato is exposed. #2 will take FOREVER because all the moisture and seeds are still enclosed in the meat of the tomato. the purpose of my slicing them this morning was insignificant, but if I was slicing them to put on my dehydrator it would be very significant. slicing them east to west, the seeds are always exposed. my main problem is that I have a hard time remembering this until I have a tray or 2 already full!!
stocking my stash: 3 jars of recently dehydrated produce. onions, bell peppers and potatoes. I also took a pic down in the tops of the jars. the onions and bell peppers are absolutely divine to smell. I can eat them straight from the jars. hahaha the bell peppers are quickly becoming a favorite chip. will be using the onions and bell peppers as a crunch factor on salads. anyone that could come up with a kitchen deodorizer spray that smells like these could make a fortune!! hahaha onions and bell peppers are crispy like a cracker or chip and the potatoes are hammer hard. hahaha I hope to get onion jar full and then get 2 more jars the same size filled with bell peppers and potatoes. this is the finishedd dehydrated potatoes from earlier up in the blog post, they are done now. yay!!
this jar is of zucchini and I weighed some before I dehydrated it and dried it separately so when it was all dehydrated, I would know what it should weigh when I ehydrate it to put in zucchini bread. that's what you see on the jar. 11 grams of dehydrated is equivalent to 2 cups rehydrated. so when I rehydrate it, it should weigh 344 grams for the recipe I like to use this in. this is a good way for you to know what the amount for a recipe should weigh. weigh it before dehydrated and then weigh it after and then you'll know what the rehydrated weight should be.
I finally got my Micro Mini Marshmallows off the dehydrator after 48 hours at 125F. that is my preferred time for most things. I had to keep my spiced pumpkin marshmallows on there until the morning at least. you can't rush the process. time is the one thing that most instructions get wrong and it causes a lot of frustration with people that are new to dehydrating. and people telling their times can also cause frustration. so I always say "set your machine to the highest time setting and leave it alone". if it's dry before the time runs out, then YAY. if not, add more time. when you have to deal with a lot of humidity, that adds a lot of time. when I was testing these to see if they were dry enough, my husband was my tester. he really likes the pumpkin spice ones and he kept saying "I need another one, I just don't know, I really need another one". marshmallow thief!!! I'm down about a quarter of bag when I realized he just wanted to eat my marshmallows even if they weren't crispy. he better be glad Santa has already been around, he would gotten a rock in stocking for such a mean trick.
got another batch of my cornbread swirls made with MORE of my dehydrated and ground up veggies in them. these are so stinkin' good. this jar of ground up goodness come about from having bits and pieces and scraps and dabs left in jars. I couldn't just toss out my hard work, so I emptied about 19 or 20 jars that had the scarps into my nurtibullet and let the good times roll. it smells wonderful and I think I have my new favorite way to make my cornbread swirls. I think the recipe for these swirls are in a post that I made within the last couple of weeks. anyway, just wanted to share that I put MORE (3 heaping tablespoons) of this goodness in this batch and they are the "business".
this is my recipe: I use my bread machine to mix. this is a YEAST bread, so it has to have the rise time. I mix it in my bread machine over the course of an hour and a half. if you use a bread machine, put ingredients in as your brand recommends. otherwise, mix and let rise and mix more and let rise and mix more over the course of an hour and a half.
Cornbread Swirls
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1 box jiffy corn muffin mix or a mix of your own
1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp yeast
1 tablespoon real butter
mix in bread machine or by hand till dough ball is well incorporated and holds together.
spread a little cornmeal on your work surface and flatten with rolling pin till about 10" by 18". brush top of bread with a tablespoon of melted butter. use a skewer or dowel rod as a straight edge and pizza cutter to cut strips , try to get at least 17 or 18 strips. lightly roll each strip to form a swirl. put on parchment lined baking sheet and let rise for about an hour and bake at 350* till browned the way you like. these are delicious!! I also sometimes make twisted sticks instead of the swirls.
(I also add in 2 tablespoons of vital wheat gluten. you don't have to have use it, I just do. also 2 tablespoons of sugar and a pinch of salt, especially if you are adding in dehydrated produce like I did.)
ATTENTION**************adding the veggies to this mix will make it very sticky. I have hand and arm issues, so I have to use a bread machine to do the mixing of all my doughs and I watch it closely. I had to add a little more flour to this particular batch, because I added 3 heaping tablespoons of my mixed veggies. just add flour 1 tablespoon at a time. if you add too much flour, just add a few drops of milk or water at a time.
cornbread swirls made with 3 heaping tablespoons of what's in the jar, my Master Mix, to cornbread swirls and they are delicious and will be wonderful with soup. you can taste the veggies and they smell so good.
just wanted to share a different way to use our dehydrated goods. this is my master mix of all the veggies on the side of the jar and this is what I put in my bread. all dehydrated and ground up for this purpose. sorry about deleting the picture.
I'm done with marshmallows. just plain marshmallowed out!!
the pumpkin spice ones gave me fits, but they did NOT win. I can now make pumpkin spice powder. I think it will be good on sweet potatoes. gonna find out, for sure. anyway, just thought I'd share. blessings on all.
so, I just wanted to share an experiment with y'all. my husband had mentioned "banana pudding". well, I got to thinking about that. I knew I didn't have any bananas, or did I? no fresh bananas, but I did have some dehydrated bananas. challenge on. how do you make a banana pudding with dehydrated bananas? I set out to find out how to do it my way. I had a box of mini vanilla wafers, 4 vanilla pudding cups and a box of cool whip. I got my jar of dehydrated bananas and got about 25 or 30 slices of dehydrated bananas and broke them up in bowl and poured boiling water over them and let them set for a while, then added a little more water. I wanted them to have a little extra liquid so they would thin the pudding down some. I popped them in the fridge to cool them down. I then mixed the pudding cups with rehydrated bananas and then added some cool whip, next I added in the vanilla wafers. got it all mixed up and put it in the bowl, put the rest of the cool whip on top and crumbled a few of the vanilla wafers on top. let me just say this. No, it's not a banana pudding made from scratch, but it is VERY good. no more of the banana slices than I used, it is very banana tasting. it's good and it won't be the last time I make this. I see more dehydrated bananas in the near future. I'm always thinking about ways to use my dehydrated goodies and I hope y'all are always thinking about how to use your goodies too. sometimes we have to think outside the box.
this is some leeks and green onions that I grew from the root balls of of some that I had purchased about a month ago. dehydrated the original leeks and green onions and have them in my stash. stuck the root balls in pots and let them grow. cut them tuesday and got them in the dehydrator on thursday. took them out this morning. my new motto is "something is better than nothing". this is a very little something, but it was free. I'm all over free. I'll see how many times I can cut from the root balls and dehydrate the cuttings. examine everything and see if you can get more than one use from it. do your own experiments about how to build your dehydrated stash. a lot of us look for sales and jump on them. when you're looking at fresh, try to figure if you can do the "cut and grow again" method. I grew carrot greens last year that I dehydrated and also a few beets greens. both from store bought carrots and beets and then I got to add the fresh greens that I grew to my "green stash". "something is better than nothing" and this is my something today. first pic is what I cut off, onions and leeks. second pic is dehydrated, leeks and onions.
I challenged myself to use as many of my dehydrated goods as I could in one dish. this is what I came up with. chicken corn chowder. I used carrots, yellow squash, white onions, mushrooms, sweet bell peppers and celery. I used about a half cup each and in a couple instances I just used what was in the jar. basically, 3 cups of dehydrated veggies. I covered that with 6 cups of homemade chicken bone broth and put in 24 oz of frozen corn, 1 pkg of ranch mix , 1 can of rotel and 2 cups of chicken that I had cooked and made the bone broth. it showed about 9 cups of everything all together. cooked it in my electric pressure cooker for about 40 minutes. once it was done, I added 1/3 of block of velveeta cheese and a whole block of cream cheese. we had it for lunch and my husband wanted to know what was different and that it was the best I had made of this particular dish. been making this for about 3 or 4 years. I told him it was full of my dehydrated veggies. it really is good. I challenge y'all to use what you have to make wonderful meals. I have a few pictures to show the progression from jars to bowl. be sure to click thru and see each picture. start to finish.
comfort food, grits, made with this particular blend that I call my "master mix". it is made with just bits and pieces and scraps of jars that are still in their jars. I empty them all in the nurtibullet and blend away. there are no measurements to make this, just little bits and dabs. it has parsley, asparagus, parsnip, green onions, red onion, zucchini, red bell pepper, green bell pepper, turnip, cilantro, rutabaga, jerusalem artichoke, celery, yellow onion, fennel, carrots, okra, jalapeno. I put about 3 tablespoons of this particular mix in my grits and it truly is delicious.
this is some of the produce I've been working on here lately. the second picture has carrots, chinese 5 color peppers, yellow potatoes and lemon squash. the next pic with some jars in it are mix of hot and sweet peppers in the first jar, cherry tomatoes and shishito peppers in the other jars in that pic. it's good to have different ways of preserving our foods. dehydrating is my fav way.
some of my goodies are dry!!! yay!!! the potatoes turned out very nice. 125* for 15 hours. this temp really does work well to maintain the color. you can actually burn some things if you set your dehydrator too high. the temp is one thing that I do watch closely. time is just a number, if it's not completely crispy dry, then time means nothing. you have to keep it going till it snaps when you break one, after it's come to room temp, and these do!! yay!! this will be enough to make what would be the equivalent of 5 store bought boxes of scalloped potatoes. I really hope to get the jar full. the ones I done yesterday are yellow potatoes. but they are translucent, almost like vellum (paper) and that's you want. now, I put them in the jar and keep them out for a week, shaking and checking the jar for any condensation, which there should be none. if you are dehydrating and notice any, then back to the dehydrator they go, because that sets the stage for mold. and, we don't want that. these will also be good to powder and make instant cup of potato soup. they also work good for a thickener in just about anything. you can break up the slices into chunks and toss a handfull in a batch of veg beef soup. you can rehydrate them and make skillet fried potatoes and onions. anything you can do with a fresh tater, you can do with these. I plan on making some shredded potatoes too, for the shredded hash browns and stuff like that. the first pic, tall jar is a gallon sized pickled okra jar. (don't judge me, I like pickled okra
hahaha) that was approximately 4 lbs of potatoes. the second pic is a shot directly down the top of the jar, I do love looking at them. the third pic shows just how see thru they are. when I do some white potatoes, you will be able to see thru them better. so, I still have my carrots and onions on letting them finish up. the humidity will affect dry time, so it may take a while longer for those. anyway, just wanted to show y'all my "taters" and I do have more to share in a hot minute.
and just so ya know, I did get that potato jar filled up!!!!! it took LOTS of potatoes, but I done it!! hahahaha
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well, that's all I have for this time. I hope you enjoy all the dehydrating projects and are maybe inspired to do some dehydrating too. it's fun and I enjoy doing it. it sure beats letting your produce go to waste. it's also great to have a purpose for it and I use it all the time. I can't wait to start replenishing everything now that Spring time is here and the garden will soon be growing again.
I'm so happy you found your way here and I hope you come back real soon. remember that God made a way for us to be in right relationship with Him thru the shed blood of Jesus Christ. He loves us that much!!! He wants to be your Lord and Savior and I pray that you will admit that you are a sinner in need of forgiveness and accept Christ as your savior and repent of your sins and believe on Him. if you do that, He'll be the best friend you've ever had or ever will have. Jesus loves you and so do I. blessings, hugs and love, patty
