Dehydration

Here in the scorching Arizona summer sun, one thing is most important to avoid- Dehydration. At suburbia farm, however, we are all for the idea! We have been doing some trial and error with dehydrating fruits- strawberries, grapes, bananas, tomatoes, and apples. Here's Jeepers with the Dehydrator layered full of our goodies.

On the left we have strawberries and apples. The apples have been dipped in lemon water to preserve their color. On the right we have bananas dipped in diluted honey and lemon to preserve color and add sweetness. The honey made the bananas oober sticky, but very tasty. These dried beauties are nature's best fruit snacks- it's like a dried fruit salad. They also make a great addition to oatmeal, making a bland breakfast staple full of variety and flavor. I think next time I'll put the bananas in a low temp oven to make them crispy.

Now, the grape/raisins gave us some difficulty. Of course, Jeepers wouldn't stop eating the grapes before I could even get them in the dehydrator. Then, they were taking a long time in the dehydrator, so I put them outside to use up the sun's free energy. The first batch blew away, then the chickens ate the second batch (stinkin' chickens). But we finally got some sun made raisins and let me tell you, they are the most delicious, juicy raisins we've ever had!

We've been growing delicious cherry tomatoes, more than we can eat at once, so I thought we'd try sun dried tomatoes. They also took a long time in the dehydrator and ended up drying outside. I haven't tried them in a recipe yet, but I'm imagining pasta, chicken, and feta with a drizzle of EVOO...?

Yummy fruit snacks!
I tried to dry corn to mimic this amazing salad from Wildflower Bread Company, but it didn't turn out at all. Maybe it would be good in a soup though...I'll keep trying.