Dehydrating fruit

So here is the dehydrated fruit I made - what is left of it, and before its all gone!

Don't the oranges look nice and glossy!

And I love the waviness of the apples - like they have been gently pleated as they dried.

What is your favorite dried fruit?  I don't like pears - they turn a little gritty, and last year I did some of our green table grapes that we grew - making yummy sultanas.....Maybe I'll have to do persimmons this year... Now if only you could dry quince without cooking them.....

I wonder what my next dehydrator project will be????  Oh, if only there were more hours in the day. I love having so many ideas in my head!

Dehydrating fruit

I had an idea to try dehydrating some citrus fruit.  We are finally coming to the end of all our citrus fruit from the garden but have a few oranges left.  I've never dehydrated citrus before but thought it sounded a nice idea.

And so I sliced them thinly, and added some apples and a couple of strawberries at the same time - might as well fill the dehydrator.

I dried them until they were crispy - and all of them are delicious.

It's great to eat the whole orange - peel as well and because its sliced so thinly, it doesn't taste too bitter.

I had great plans for these crispy snacks - creating something more than just dried fruit - but we ate them before I could finish the plan! I'll have to do some more and not leave them out to be eaten!!

This really is the easiest way to
preserve apples and when our harvest starts later in the year, I know I'll be doing plenty more. You don't have to peel and core the apples - just slice using a mandolin, no need to add anything to them (so unlike bought dried apples, no sulphur or citric acid) - and then just put them in a dehydrator and forget about them for a few hours.

Easy Peasy!  Roll on apple harvest!

Truly Scrumptious - Sun-dried Rainier Cherries

Yum, yum, yum! My favorite food this week has to be sun-dried Rainier Cherries from Cipponeri Family Farms.

I was meeting a friend for lunch yesterday at Greens in Fort Mason, San Francisco and when I got there, there was a farmers' market.  As I wandered around, what first caught my eye were unpasturized almonds - meaning that, unlike the majority of almonds - these are truly raw.  Even those you buy that are labelled "raw" tend to have been steam pasteurized and thus have lost some of their micronutrient content.  I did buy some almonds, but haven't even tried them yet.  Maybe they will be next week's "truly scrumptious"?

But as I went down the line of nuts and dried fruits at this stand, I spotted the rainier cherries.  I've never seen dried Rainiers before...and they had some samples. Gosh, their texture is still a little moist and "spongy" - not too dry,  and so vibrant in flavour.  They have some tartness - but it balances nicely with a little sweetness.

I can see that I am going to have to call in to that particular Farmer's market regularly to keep up a good stock of these!

I guess the only thing that would have improved them was if they were organic and didn't use sulphur dioxide.....but I did ask them about their pesticide use etc.

What was your favorite taste this week?