DEHYDRATING: MY NEW BEST FRIEND!

  Have you ever had that wonderful feeling, you know the one.  When your bed and sheets have accepted you as one of their own and they don't want to let you go.  No matter how loudly and rudely that mean screaming alarm rings.  Well I have and love knowing that my bed and sheets have accepted me so warmly.  Never the less that alarm just won't stop ringing no matter how hard you throw it.  So up I get to do my daily chores.  Starting with feeding the animals, collecting eggs and filling waterers.   Then onto breakfast, dishes, housework and collecting produce.  Somewhere in there comes running errands and canning, lunch, canning, dinner, dishes, Jeopardy, crocheting or needle work and then the wonderful moment I get to reunite with my bed and sheets.  As you can see my dilemma, canning is taking up a lot of time.  I really don't mind canning, I just would like to have time for a few other things.  But the produce has to be dealt with.  So what's a grandma to do?

As number one grandson used to say when he was just a few years old:  think, think, think (while he was tapping his little index finger on his chin), I know, I got an idea!  I've been watching a few videos on youtube about other methods of preserving food.  Lo and behold were these wonderful people expounding on the virtues of dehydrating.  I was thinking this looked good in theory but...  So I decided to give it a go any way.  My thought was I would set up the dehydrator and let it do its thing, while I did mine.  I would say this is the best thing since sliced bread, (but I'd rather not have sliced bread with all it's preservatives.)  So I'll just simply say I think I'm going to like this. 

Wash, slice and blanch are some of my favorite things to do now.  I said blanch because some folks say blanching some veggies shortens the dehydrating time as well and keeping items like celery from seeming woody when rehydrated.  If your thinking washing slicing and blanching is still going to take up a lot of time it really isn't.  I am running two dehydrators with seven trays at a time.  So once they're filled I'm done.   When the veggies are done dehydrating and the dehydrators are turned off, I let them sit for about thirty minutes to cool down.  Then I place the veggies in a quart jar.  Once the jar is full, I use my Food Saver Vacuum Sealer (with the lid sealer.)  You can also throw a oxygen absorber in before sealing the jar.  This isn't canning and you will have to keep a close eye out for spoilage.  However I'm told this is a good method for preserving food for long term storage. 

Just think, this winter when the wind is blowing and there's a cold rain coming down I can make a nice pot of hot soup without any worries.  I won't have to worry about not having fresh celery on hand because I can go to a jar pull some out and rehydrate it.  This will also go for carrots, onions and anything else I may want to throw into to the pot.

Oh yeah and lets not forget how much space you save.  I think I put about four pounds of corn in a quart jar.  That much corn would have used at least four quart jars if canned.

Have a Safe and Blessed day and remember, share your knowledge.