Vegetables

Dried Vegetables

Dried vegetable have made a comeback these days, particularly the Italian versions which, after being sun dried are stored in olive oil and then offered at ludicrously high prices indeed. Vegetables which are easily sun dried include tomatoes, capsicums, chilies, mushrooms and aborigines. You should select only top quality vegetables cleaning them and cutting away any unwanted parts.

How to Make Preprations

The vegetables should then be very thinly sliced, spread on clean metal trays, in the case of mushrooms a flattish basket is fine, and put out in direct sunshine to dry but not if there is any humidity in the atmosphere as this will spoil them completely.

The finely cut vegetable may need turning over a few times during the drying process which can take as little as two days and as long as six days depending on temperatures. You may also like to loosely cover them with very fine muslin cloth to keep the flies at bay.

Where should be stored

The finished product can be stored in airtight jar or containers, or as the Italians do, in sterilized glass jars filled to the top with olive oil. In some areas of America and its surrounding sliced turnips, potatoes and carrots are dried for use in a variety of traditional dishes.

How to Dry: Finalization

It is now possible to purchase specially designed, electric powered dryers for fruits and vegetables but as these are imported they are very highly priced indeed and only dry a small quantity at a time. Solar powered dryers are indigenously made and have a very high capacity, but as I do not have any personal experience of using one I can not vouch for their efficiency. However, if they are anything like the solar over I purchased then they are a complete waste of time!