Pinch Your Pennies - Home Dehydration

We use a lot of dried fruit around here (apples, bananas, pineapple, mango, guava, pears).  I use it in my oatmeal, in my granola, in my granola bars, just as a snack, etc.  I use a fair amount of dehydrated vegetables, as well (sweet potatoes, zucchini, eggplant, red pepper).  They crisp up into nice "chips" for dipping into hummus or salsa.  It's convenient; it's healthy; it's easy, and it's really quite good for you.

I'll spare you a repeat of my rant on why you shouldn't buy dehydrated fruits in the grocery stores, and just link to it instead.  That way, if you've seen it once, you don't have to see it again.  Along with all of the health reasons you shouldn't buy pre-packaged dehydrated fruits, there's the cost reason as well.  One pound of  banana chips costs $2.70 at my local grocery store.  I can buy 22 pounds of baby bananas at the local Hispanic market for $5.00!  At the same grocery store, a ten ounce bag of dehydrated apple slices costs almost $3.00.  I just paid 59¢ a pound for red delicious apples.  I don't suppose I need to point out that the savings here is HUGE!

You don't need special equipment to dehydrate; you can do it in your oven at a very low temperature.  I even know one guy who dehydrates his fruit in a cardboard box on the dash of his car during the summer months.  I, however, use a simple, no frills, food dehydrator.  It was $40.00 at Target, and it's paid for itself many many times over since I bought it.

The prep can be a tiny bit time consuming, but the end result is more than worth it, and it's not like it's hard or anything.  You just wash up the produce you want to dehydrate, and you cut it into uniform slices.  The thinner they are, the quicker they dehydrate.  If they're thicker, they take longer, but they're also crispier.

My mother-in-law gave me this handy dandy apple slicer and corer gizmo, and it's turned out to be invaluable!  I slice my apples much thinner after the initial cut, but having it already cored is great!

Then you just load up the dehydrator trays and turn it on.  Piece of cake!

In about two days, I'll have a nice big bowlful of dehydrated apple chips.  Then I'll start on the bananas.  I've discovered that there's just no such thing as too many dehydrated banana chips!  Yum.

Store them in an airtight container, and they'll keep pretty much indefinitely.