Back before modern pressure canners and freezers , food dehydration evolved out of necessity . This simple dehydrating proficiency offer a straight method acting to keep food from spoiling while hold its nutritionary content . Today , nutrient dehydrating blends these centuries - old techniques with unexampled technologies that simplify the dehydrating process and make it more fun .
Food desiccation saves money because you could buy or grow seasonal green goods to dry and lay in for twelvemonth - round consumption . Another perk of food dehydration is compact storage — especially important if you live on in tight quarters with limited computer storage space . A bushel of freshtomatoeswill dehydrate down to a few jarful of sunlight - dry tomatoes that easy gibe on your larder shelf .
“ Drying food is one of humankind ’s oldest ways ofpreserving intellectual nourishment , because it is simple , humbled - technical school and put up an fantabulous way to put aside the premium of summer for the winter , ” says Sharon Astyk , a Fannie Farmer in upstate New York and author ofIndependence day : A guidebook to Sustainable Food Storage and Preservation ” ( novel Society).“Eating locally and sustainably , not just in the summer but all class long , is an substantive part of trying to achieve a viable future tense and a way of biography that can go on for multiple generations . ”
Food dehydrating is found on one Congress of Racial Equality principle : Quickly murder as much wet from the food as possible to curb the growth of bacteria , mold and yeast . Some hoi polloi prefer to dry out food because it takes less metre , money and energy than other intellectual nourishment - store method acting , such as canning or freeze .
There are two occult element to drying intellectual nourishment that you need to stock up on : time and patience . It takes time to dry out food , from a few hours to a few day count on the method you use and the production you want . The good news is that while these dry methods take metre , they do n’t require much hand - on effort . After you prep the food for dry out , you typically need to mark on it throughout the dehydrating physical process ; then you could go about your life sentence .
Like all forms of food preservation , solid food safety techniques must be followed . Cleanliness is vital throughout the cognitive operation . Wash your hand in warm , oleaginous weewee and be sure that your kitchen counter , utensil and exsiccate equipment is sanitized with an appropriate solution . A common solution is one tablespoon of whitener in a congius of water .
Excerpt from the Popular Kitchen Series magabookCanning & Preservingwith permission from its publisher , BowTie cartridge holder , a division of BowTie Inc. Purchase Canning & Preserving here .
