It seems that lately, from day to day, the world we are living in changes and morphs from what we are used to.
As a result, many are choosing to turn to new ways in which to preserve their food and make it last. One such food is that of apples.
Nothing is better than being able to store your apples for months and use them in all of your favorites recipes.
There are three ways in which this can be done, and they all involve dehydrating the fruit. By drying your apples, you can extend their shelf life and winter them over from year to year.
The methods we will look at are air-drying, oven drying, and by way of using a food dehydrator (my personal choice).
Prepping Solution
The first crucial step to dehydrating is to make sure you properly prep your apples. Some people choose to peel their apples while others don’t. I am a peel-off kind of girl, so I peel my apples before drying.
As I peel and slice the apples I put them in a bowl of water with salt added. You could use lemon juice or citric acid, but I have found that saltwater works well for me.
Make sure whichever solution you use that you leave your slices in it for at least 10 minutes. I then choose to rinse the slices before drying, but this is a personal choice.
Air Drying Apples
This is the “old-fashioned” manner of drying apples, as it merely involves stringing them on a string and then hanging them to dry naturally. Most often, they were hung near either the kitchen fireplace or the cookstove.
Oven Drying Apples
Preheat your oven to 150 degrees F or the lowest setting possible on your oven. Place your apples on cooling racks, and then place the cooling racks onto baking sheets.
By using the cooling racks, you are permitting the air to circulate around the slices and better dry them out fully. Allow your apples to dry for 2-3 hours, flipping them every hour.
Electric Dehydrator
This is my preferred manner of drying my apples. I take my slices, and place them on the dehydrator racks, making sure they do not touch each other.
I set the trays on my dehydrator and turn it on. With my dehydrator, it usually takes a full twelve hours, and I do rotate my racks every four hours to make sure of even drying.