Popular Foods to Dehydrate

Using a food dehydrator is a great way to create healthy snacks that you can take along anywhere. A popular concern with new food dehydrator users, however, is that they do not know which foods are the best to dehydrate. Here are a few popular foods to dehydrate and a few tips to help you get the best results.

Fruits

Dehydrated fruit is probably the most common category of dehydrated food. A lot of fruits take well to dehydration because they are high in vitamin C which keeps them from spoiling before the drying process is over. Apples and pears are the most common followed by apricots and peaches. Mangoes dry very well, and everyone knows that dried grapes are raisins. Fruits that do not dry well are bananas and melons.

Vegetables

Dried veggies are also easy to make; however, you do not just slice the veggies and put them in a dehydrator as you do with fruit. You must blanch them first, and then dry them. Do this by dropping them into boiling water for one minute. Then, remove them from the boiling water, and drop them into ice water to stop the cooking process. The best veggies for drying are carrots, broccoli, snow peas, cauliflower and green beans.

Making dried foods at home is a lot of fun and provides you with a healthy snacks. Knowing where to start is the first step. Start with these popular fruits and veggies, then experiment with some more on your own.