My favorite way to preserve food is through dehydrating. Not only is it one of the easiest ways to preserve, it is the most beneficial. When something is dehydrated the water is removed but the nutrients stay intact, even when something is frozen there is nutrient loss. Dehydrating takes up a lot less space on your pantry shelves and leaves precious freezer space for other things. And best of all you can get a 5-10 year self life versus 1-2 years for canning and 6 months for the freezer!
Dehydrating is very versatile, you can dehydrate something whole, chopped, or pureed. Today we will be dehydrating whole apricots and making fruit leather.
Dehydrating is very versatile, you can dehydrate something whole, chopped, or pureed. Today we will be dehydrating whole apricots and making fruit leather.
Whole Apricots
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Before dehydrating fruits it's a good idea to soak in lemon juice or citric acid for 10-15 minutes to prevent browning. I used 1 Tbsp. citric acid per 1 gallon of cold water. Citric acid is more concentrated than lemon juice and does a better job of preserving color.
Next, fill your trays and place on the fruit/veggie setting. I like my apricots a raisin like texture, still soft. What I got was very chewy ones because I forgot about them and they went all night long. I tell you this so you remember to check on those babies after about 8 hours. If they need to go overnight I just lower the temperature and check first think in the morning. I store mine in quart jars and if you have a food saver with the canning attachment you can prolong the shelf life even longer.
Apricot Fruit Leather
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Last year I pureed my apricots and threw them on my dehydrator trays and thought I was good to go. They were so tart that no one would eat them and they ended up in the compost pile. Well this year I was going to make a yummy batch of apricot fruit leather - enter some sweetener. Honey is my favorite sweetener so that is what we used. As a rule of thumb about a tablespoon honey per cup of puree. Although after taste testing we stopped measuring and just poured the honey in until it tasted good and sweet.
Place on the fruit roll sheets for the dehydrator and dehydrate at 100 or below to preserve the healing benefits of the honey. It should peel and bend easily when done. I let mine go too long again (I get distracted easily) so we had apricot "crisps" along with fruit leather. After peeling them off, roll up in plastic wrap and store in an airtight container.
