Food Preservation.....

Oh how I love this time of year!  The garden is producing and friends are bringing over goodies to share!  But you can only use so much at one time, so what to do?  A family friend has been bringing me onions... and a few months ago he brought over dried onions.  Talk about A.M.A.Z.I.N.G!!!  I use them in everything and have even just eaten as a snack!  The best is when I toss on top of home made pizza and they are all toasty.. yum!

So this year I decided to dry my own this year.  Preparation is easy as slicing the onions.... really, that is it!  I then placed in my food dehydrator and then waited

 Wa-la... dried onions!

This is what I ended up with after slicing and dicing about 15 pounds of onions!!!  Way easier to store and keeps a lot longer than fresh onions.  I also found a recipe for grinding up dried onions with dried garlic and peppercorns and may have to try this out!

I also hit the blackberry patch in my back pasture.... nothing like free fruit for the picking!  After eating my weight in blackberries, I even had some left to freeze.  My favorite thing to do is freeze in a large pan, single depth, so they are frozen individually instead of in a clump.

Then I put them in a ziplock bag, and just poor out the amount I need without having to thaw the entire bag!  I use this with all berries,  so much easier to use this way!

And lastly, I worked on the apples!  They may not have looked perfect, but it is easy enough to cut around and get the good parts out!  Since my dehydrator was empty, decided to make some cinnamon sugar apple chips.  I choose to peel my apples, but you don't have to... all depends on what you like!  When peeling and slicing, I put the sliced apples in lemon juice and water.  It helps keep the apples from turning brown.  Next, I put in a colander to drain as much liquid as possible and transfer to another bowl.  Here comes the fun part, sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon and stir well.  How much you ask?  Well, I am a dump and taste type of girl, so as much as you like or none at all!

Next place on you racks and let her rip!

As far as times, a lot of that depends on your type of dehydrator.  With mine, I start everything at level 10 for 2 hours then turn down to level 7.  The onions took way longer than the apples.... the onions were on level 7 for about 14 hours.  The apples for more like seven (they are not quite done yet.. but have tasted them and they are yummy!)

I have been pinning away ideas on Pinterest, think I may try dried zucchini chips next.  Maybe a great choice instead of potato chips!