For people who’ve adopted our secrets and techniques and methods and methods to your greatest strawberry harvest, you’ve most probably acquired a ton of vibrant purple berries in your fingers this 12 months.
Discovering your self with an infinite basket or two of strawberries requires motion as they spoil shortly as shortly as picked. This 12 months, whereas canning strawberry jam and freezing baggage of strawberries, keep in mind dehydrating a quart or two.
You’ll perceive the enchantment after only one mannequin of an additional candy strawberry slice straight out of your dehydrator. When you could also be tempted to snack on them instantly, I encourage you to stay away from shedding for the darkest and coldest days of winter. As dehydrated strawberries are tasty, bite-sized snacks which can transport you as soon as extra to the canine days of summer season season with one chunk.
Advantages of Dehydrating Strawberries
While you ponder the methods you presumably can retailer strawberries to make the most of later all through the 12 months, many people instantly ponder jam. And why wouldn’t you? Strawberry jam is the proper! Normally, the second choice is freezing the berries full for use later when wanted.
Few folks ponder dehydrating their strawberries to avoid wasting a lot of loads of for later. However there are some fairly compelling causes to find out on dehydration over these completely completely different strategies.
Save Dwelling
For people who’ve acquired restricted house, freezing strawberries for long-term storage instantly presents factors. If the one freezer you could have purchased is the one constructed into your fridge, at most, you’ll solely be succesful to retailer only a few quarts. Even having a small chest freezer means being frugal with the world in it.
Dehydrating strawberries reduces their measurement, making storing them quite a bit a lot much less of an infinite deal. What would usually require varied baggage can merely be saved in your pantry in a single bag, taking on quite a bit a lot much less house than even a batch of jam.
Loads a lot much less Work
I like hand-crafted jam, nonetheless I don’t love the day spent in a steamy kitchen over a scorching fluctuate and the fuss of canning the completed jam. And when you’re completed, there’s at all times a sticky mess to clean up. Optimistic, it’s just one or two days out of the 12 months, nevertheless when you end up with a busy summer season season, canning jam is an exact draw back.
Earlier the washing and slicing, dehydrating strawberries takes little or no hands-on time, leaving you free to do completely completely different factors whereas your berries dry. And clean-up is minimal when you’re completed.
Lasts Longer
Arms down, dehydrated meals lasts longer than freezing or canning. And as shortly as a result of it’s dried, they don’t require any further vitality to deal with them from spoiling, not like all through the freezer.
Working With Strawberries
For people who’ve ever had freshly-picked strawberries, you perceive how shortly they spoil. My recommendation when dealing with these tasty berries is to clear your calendar for the day. Plan to determine on and course of your berries all on the equal day. And I point out for every half – canning, freezing, and dehydrating.
The second they’re snapped from the vine, strawberries start to say no.
Even ready a day before you do one factor with them can result in many bruised berries or mildew rising amongst them. They don’t preserve appropriately all through the fridge, and when you wash them, you have to use them immediately.
So, it’s greatest to have a ‘strawberry day’ and plan accordingly, notably for many who happen to plan to dehydrate some.
Save the proper berries in your basket for dehydrating. When freezing or making jam, it’s okay to have berries with a blemish or mushy spot correct proper right here or there. However on the subject of dehydrating berries, solely the firmest, blemish-free berries will do. Even the berries which is probably blemish-free, nonetheless beginning to darken with age, ought to be used for jam or be frozen, as they’re already beginning to degrade and can have a better water content material materials supplies.
Firm, blemish-free berries will yield the proper outcomes and the quickest drying time.
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