Dehydrating fruits

[Clay]

I have a bunch of fruit to dehydrate, so I thought I would start a thread on it!

Here's my technique for strawberries. They are pretty easy, slice and dehydrate! You can blanch them in simple syrup if you like, but I don't ever think it's necessary.

What other fruits do you dehydrate? What's the recipe for it?

[Clay]

I have some pineapple to do as well, so I'm going to use this as my guide:

http://selfreliantschool.com/how-to-dehydrate-fresh-pineapple/

[Jerry D Young]

Fruits that tend to turn brown when exposed to air for much time can be dipped in lemon juice to prevent the brown color while dehydrating. Bananas and apples especially.

The drier one gets the fruits the longer they will last. Many people dry to a leather texture, which makes for really tasty, good eating dried fruits, but they will not last as long as those dried to a hard and crispy stage. Vacuum sealing them will extend the life significantly, but there is still a finite life for soft dried fruits.

Just my opinion.

[Clay]

I used to vacuum seal them, but with two kids in the house they never last through a winter. Now I just put them in canning jars, and I've never had them go bad by the following summer.

The strawberries turned out great by the way.

I have a bunch of apples and pears from the trees in the yard, I'll be doing those soon too.

[Ken K7KBJ]

When dehydrated fruits go bad, do we know by seeing mold growth on them or by some other clue?

[Clay]

I honestly don't know for sure. Like I said, I haven't ever had an issue with having to keep then for over a year. We try and live by the rules of "store what you eat and eat what you store" and "first in first out".

Since Jerry pointed out that it's better to get them drier for longevity, my guess would be that it would be mold that would be the issue. Less moisture means there would be less for the mold to grow.

If anyone has a definitive answer I would appreciate it as well.

[Jerry D Young]

If there is visible mold, then the fruits need to be checked. If you can wipe the mold off with vinegar and there is no bad smell, then I would go ahead and use them. But I would cook them. If they smell bad, as well as have mold on them, I would recycle them through the compost.

Some discoloration is to be expected over time, but major, uneven color, and swelling generally indicate the stuff has gone bad, especially if the vacuum sealed package has swollen, too, indicating some outgassing by the fruit or by something contaminating it.

Just my opinion.

[Clay]

This is the method I used for drying the Pears.

http://foodpreservation.about.com/od/Dehydrating/ss/How-To-Dry-Pears-In-A-Dehydrator.htm#showall

They turned out really good!